THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 
OF  CALIFORNIA 

IN  MEMORY  OF 

Professor  Aram  Torossian 
l88ii-19iLl 


f 


UNIVERSITY   EXTENSION   MANUALS 
EDITED  BY  PROFESSOR  KNIGHT 


THE 
PHILOSOPHY    OF    THE    BEAUTIFUL 

I 
ITS    HISTORY 


I 

THE 


Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful 


BEING 


Outlines  of  the  History  of  ^Esthetics 


I'.Y 

WILLIAM 

PROFESSOR    OF    PHILOSOPHY    IN    THE    UNIVERSITY    OF   ST.    ANDREWS 


Beauty,  Good,  and  Knowledge  are  three  sisters 
That  doat  upon  each  other,  friends  to  man, 
Living  together  under  the  same  roof, 
And  never  can  be  sunder'd  without  tears. 

TENNYSON. 


NEW   YORK 

CHARLES    SCRIBNER'S    SONS 

743  &   745   BROADWAY 

I  891 

A II  rights  reserved 


Nu 
Kc 


PREFACE 

THIS  book  originated  in  a  course  of  lectures  delivered 
to  the  Philosophical  Institution  of  Edinburgh  in  1889, 
and  afterwards  to  a  University  Extension  audience  in 
London,  and  at  Cheltenham.  In  these  lectures  a  dis- 
cussion of  the  Philosophy  of  Beauty,  and  an  attempt  at 
constructive  theory,  preceded  an  outline  of  the  History 
of  Opinion,  and  a  critical  analysis  of  the  chief  theories 
of  ^Esthetic.  The  former  section  of  the  course  was 
longer  than  the  latter,  and  it  was  my  original  intention 
to  expand  both  of  them,  in  somewhat  equal  proportions, 
into  a  connected  Treatise. 

In  making  a  more  minute  study  of  the  literature  of 
the  subject,  however,  the  works  of  many  minor  writers 
had  to  be  examined,  as  well  as  those  which  have  a  claim 
to  rank  as  major.  Although  they  have  not  added  any- 
thing absolutely  new  to  the  philosophy  of  Esthetics, 
they  have  usually  restated  the  problem,  common  to  them 
all,  in  such  a  way  as  to  entitle  them  to  mention — and  to 
honourable  mention — in  any  History,  that  lays  claim 
to  be  even  approximately  complete.  In  such  a  matter, 
finality  is  of  course  impossible ;  but  fulness,  as  well  as 
accuracy,  is  essential  in  every  record  of  opinion. 

I  have  therefore  judged  it  most  expedient  to  omit 
the  discussion  of  the  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful  in  the 
present  volume,  except  in  so  far  as  it  comes  out  in  the 

786 


vi  Preface 

critical  estimate  of  theories,  and  to  confine  myself  in 
the  main  to  a  historical  sketch  of  past  opinion  and 
tendency.  In  this  form,  and  as  a  work  of  reference,  it 
may  probably  be  of  greater  use  to  the  students  of  the 
subject,  than  the  constructive  theory  with  which  I  in- 
tend to  follow  it  by  and  by. 

One  or  two  remarks,  however,  on  the  general  prob- 
lem of  the  Beautiful  may  serve  to  bring  out  the  relation 
in  which  the  speculative  discussion  of  the  subject  stands 
to  its  historical  treatment. 

From  the  dawn  of  Philosophy,  greater  interest  has 
been  felt  in  Metaphysics  and  in  Ethics,  than  in  what  is 
now  commonly  known  as  /Esthetics.  It  has  been  thought 
that  the  questions  which  arise  in  the  two  former  spheres 
are  graver,  more  radical,  and  also  more  soluble,  than 
those  which  belong  to  the  latter.  It  is  one  aim  of  the 
following  pages  to  disprove  this,  by  showing  how  the 
problems  of  all  the  departments  interlace,  and  more 
especially  to  point  out  the  close  bearing  which  the 
answers  given  in  the  last  of  them  have  upon  the  ques- 
tions raised  in  the  other  two.  To  see  the  correlation  of 
the  spheres  of  the  True,  the  Beautiful,  and  the  Good,  is 
quite  as  important  to  the  students  of  each  of  them,  as  it 
is  to  note  the  distinction  and  the  independence  of  their 
provinces ;  for,  as  Tennyson  puts  it — 

Beauty,  Good,  and  Knowledge  are  three  sisters 
That  doat  upon  each  other,  friends  to  man, 
Living  together  under  the  same  roof, 
And  never  can  be  sunder'd  without  tears. 

These  lines  of  the  chief  seer  amongst  poets  now  living, 
embody  the  central  thought  of  this  book. 

The  word  './Esthetic3  is  not  a  particularly  happy 
one.  It  is  often  vaguely  used  in  Philosophy,  as  well  as 
in  ordinary  speech ;  and,  in  some  quarters,  it  has  be- 
come a  byword  of  opprobrium — a  sort  of  symbol  of 


Preface  vii 

intellectual  weakness.1  The  same  is  true,  however,  with 
many  other  philosophical  terms.  The  realist  and  the 
idealist,  the  catholic  and  the  eclectic,  have  each  been 
laughed  at ;  and  the  best  way,  as  some  one  has  said,  to 
rob  philosophic  nicknames  of  their  sting,  is  for  sensible 
men  to  take  them  up,  and  use  them.  The  Greek  term 
cuo"077cris,  of  which  it  is  the  English  equivalent,  denoted 
simply  perception  by  the  senses  ;  and  as  it  was  employed 
till  the  close  of  last  century  (even  by  Kant  in  his  Kriti- 
ken\  the  original  Greek  idea  was  retained.  Since  the 
time  of  Baumgarten,  however  (see  p.  51),  most  writers 
have  limited  the  term  'aesthetic'  to  that  section  of 
knowledge  and  feeling,  which  concerns  the  Beautiful  in 
all  its  aspects,  including  the  Sublime  along  with  the 
Picturesque,  and  embracing  Art  as  well  as  Nature.  In 
this  definite  sense,  the  word  may  now  be  said  to  be 
almost  naturalised  in  the  languages  of  Germany,  France, 
England,  Italy,  and  Holland. 

But  is  there  a  philosophy,  or  a  science,  of  ^Esthetics 
at  all?  There  are  some  persons  who  have  a  profound 
appreciation  of  Beauty,  who  do  not  care  to  theorise 
about  it.  They  distrust  a  philosophy  of  the  Beautiful, 
imagining  that  if  we  try  to  get  at  its  secret,  its  charm 
will  vanish ;  and  they  think  that  reflection  upon  it 
should  be  confined  to  what  one  of  our  English  writers 
called — it  was  the  title  of  his  book — an  "analytical 
enquiry  into  the  principles  of  taste."  This  is  not  only 
a  reaction  from  the  synthetic  treatment  of  the  subject, 
it  involves  the  abandonment  of  all  theory  or  philosophic 
speculation  regarding  it ;  and  it  is  not  a  little  remarkable 
that  an  agnostic  attitude  of  mind  in  reference  to  the 

1  The  home  of  '  the  esthete  '  is  easily  caricatured  ;  but,  underneath 
the  eccentricities  of  this  type  of  the  dilettante,  there  has  been  a  real 
love  of  the  Beautiful,  a  feeling  for — as  well  as  an  aspiration  after  it — 
which  only  require  the  alliance  of  robuster  elements  to  give  increased 
harmony  to  our  nineteenth-century  life. 


viii  Preface 

Beautiful  is  adopted  by  some  of  the  most  ardent  up- 
holders of  the  a  priori  or  intuitional  doctrine  of  Know- 
ledge and  of  Morals.  Amongst  contemporary  idealists 
there  are  philosophers  of  renown  who  think  we  cannot 
reach  any  satisfactory  conclusion  in  the  field  of  aesthetics. 
They  point  to  the  discord  of  the  schools,  their  rival 
theories,  the  vagueness  of  argument — a  maximum  of 
debate,  with  a  minimum  of  result.  They  remind  us 
how  it  was  the  ambition  of  every  aspirant  in  philosophy, 
in  his  undergraduate  days,  to  solve  the  problem  of  the 
Beautiful;  and  they  say,  with  the  astronomer- poet  of 
Persia,  Omar  Khayyam — 

Myself  when  young  did  eagerly  frequent 
Doctor  and  saint,  and  heard  great  argument 

About  it  and  about ;  but  evermore 
Came  out  by  the  same  door,  where  in  I  went. 

The  study  of  History,  as  well  as  of  Philosophy, 
shows,  however,  that  this  agnostic  attitude  in  reference 
to  the  Beautiful  is  quite  as  irrational  as  is  the  dogmatic 
attitude  of  the  doctrinaire.  There  are  moods  of  mind, 
as  every  one  knows,  in  which  one  does  not  require  a 
theory  of  Beauty ;  but  neither,  in  these  moods,  do  we 
require  a  theory  of  the  True,  or  of  the  Good.  It  must 
also  be  admitted  that  when  our  intellectual  discern- 
ment is  clearest — and  when,  in  consequence,  a  theory 
emerges — the  underlying  mystery  of  things  is  often  more 
vividly  realised  than  it  is  at  other  times.  A  theory  is 
only  a  transient  interpretation  of  the  Universe  by  the 
0ew/3os,  the  onlooker ;  and  the  fact  that  he  has  happened 
to  look  on  it  from  a  luminous  point  of  view  does  not 
prevent  his  seeing  the  veil  of  mystery  behind. 

But  the  speculative  puzzle  as  to  what  underlies  our 
theories — whether  they  relate  to  Truth,  Goodness,  or 
Beauty — never  troubles  us,  till  we  double  back  upon 
our  primary  instincts,  and  scrutinise  them,  or  ask  for 


Preface  ix 

their  justification.  As  soon  as  we  do  so,  our  ignorance 
is  disclosed  to  such  an  extent  that  many  prefer  to 
theorise  no  longer,  to  give  up  the  philosophic  quest, 
and  return  to  the  earlier  state  of  mere  recipiency  and 
enjoyment.  So  true  is  it  of  all  ultimate  things,  as  St. 
Augustine  said  of  Time,  "What  is  it?  If  unasked,  I 
know ;  if  you  ask  me,  I  know  not."  Our  apprehension 
of  these  ultimata  may  be,  to  adapt  a  phrase  of  Plato's, 
"something  more  dusky  than  knowledge,  something 
more  luminous  than  ignorance,"  and  we  may  wisely 
prefer  a  twilight  view  of  things,  if  our  eyes  are  not 
specially  adapted  for  a  direct  vision  of  the  sun.  It  is 
almost  a  commonplace  to  affirm  that  all  our  knowledge 
of  existence  lies  between  two  opposite  realms  of  ignor- 
ance. Certainly  we  at  present  stand  upon  a  small  (occa- 
sionally sunlit)  promontory,  stretching  out  from  the  land 
of  primal  mystery  whence  we  came,  into  the  ocean  of  a 
still  vaster  ignorance,  over  which  we  must  set  out ;  and 
to  many  minds  there  is  an  equal  fascination  in  the  girdle 
of  darkness,  and  in  the  zone  of  light. 

Agnosticism — as  the  formulated  creed  of  nescience 
— never  lasts,  either  with  the  individual  or  with  the 
race.  It  is  familiar  as  a  passing  mood  to  all  who 
recognise  the  final  inscrutability  of  things.  But  if  any 
one  adopts  it  as  his  creed,  he  abandons  reason,  or 
pronounces  its  exercise  to  be  illusory.  Neither  the 
individual,  nor  the  race,  has  ever  acquiesced  in  such  a 
view  of  its  powers,  for  any  length  of  time  ;  and  specu- 
lation as  to  the  ultimate  essence  of  things — admittedly 
mysterious — always  revives,  after  every  temporary  sup- 
pression. The  overthrow  of  an  accepted  dogma,  its 
demonstrated  failure  to  exhaust  the  subject  with  which 
it  deals,  instead  of  preventing  the  rise  of  a  new  one, 
rather  promotes  it.  All  history  shows  that  the  world 
soon  tires  of  its  best  theories,  and  that  it  would  rather 
dispense  with  philosophising,  than  be  tied  down  to  one 


x  Preface 

philosophy.  Solution  after  solution  is  struck  out  by  the 
mind  of  the  race,  like  those  vital  products  evolved  by 
the  anima  mundi,  which  live  and  perish  in  the  struggle 
for  existence.  They  "  have  their  day,  and  cease  to  be," 
but  the  organic  thought  of  the  world  moves  on,  demand- 
ing a  fresh  interpretation  of  the  mystery  of  things ; 
and  it  wearies  of  agnosticism,  sooner  than  it  becomes 
tired  of  any  single  theory,  however  imperfect.  That  its 
instincts  are  on  the  side  of  the  positive  and  the  con- 
structive, rather  than  of  the  negative  and  the  destructive, 
will  be  abundantly  seen  in  the  historical  outlines  which 
follow. 

It  may  be  asked,  however,  why  we  should  care  to 
record  all  the  theoretic  guesses,  conjectures,  and  approxi- 
mate solutions — recorded  in  books  and  essays,  as  well 
as  in  larger  treatises — when  the  main  point  is  the 
goal  to  which  each  has  tended,  and  the  discoveries 
that  have  very  gradually  resulted  from  them?  The 
answer  is  at  hand.  It  is  because  there  is  no  final  goal ; 
and  because  every  stage  reached  in  the  evolution  of  the 
mind  of  the  race,  while  dealing  with  the  problems  of 
Philosophy,  has  an  almost  equal  interest.  To  the 
student  of  History,  these  are  not  only  links  in  a  chain 
which  can  never  be  completed,  they  are  also  the  pro- 
gressive unfolding  of  the  Universal  Reason — which  im- 
measurably transcends  that  of  the  individual,  and  is 
nevertheless  its  deepest  essence.  As  such,  the  theoretic 
guesses  of  the  earliest  generations — which  we  can 
recover  by  analogy  when  statistics  fail  us — are  much 
more  interesting  than  the  fossil  remains  of  a  still 
earlier  life,  which  we  find  in  the  rock  strata  of  the  earth  ; 
and  as  memorials  of  past  insight,  they  contain  a  partial 
key  to  the  theories  of  to-day.  . 

Accurate  knowledge  of  previous  speculation  is  always 
our  best  guide  in  the  study  of  a  problem  that  is  peren- 
nial ;  and  while  the  history  of  Philosophy  shows  that  the 


Preface  xi 

most  perfect  theory  is  doomed  to  oblivion,  no  less 
certainly  than  the  imperfect  ones,  and  that  they  all 
revive  after  temporary  extinction,  we  can  contribute 
nothing  of  value  to  the  controversies  of  our  time  by 
striving  after  an  originality  that  dispenses  with  the 
past. 

Before  we  begin  the  examination  of  these  theories, 
it  is  perhaps  worthy  of  note  that  a  study  of  the  Beautiful, 
and  its  appreciation,  has  often  proved  a  counteractive 
to  cynicism,  and  to  the  despair  of  reaching  conclusions 
that  are  verifiable  in  other  provinces.  It  is  obvious 
that  the  study  cannot  be  either  begun,  or  carried 
on,  in  the  nil  admirari  mood  of  the  cynic.  Even 
when  the  search  for  "first  principles"  has  been  aban- 
doned, metaphysics  given  up,  and  the  "categorical 
imperative "  deemed  baseless,  a  reliable  footing  has 
been  found  in  the  sphere  of  the  Beautiful,  whence  a 
way  may  be  discovered,  leading  back  into  that  of  the 
True  and  the  Good.  Matthew  Arnold  represented 
Goethe  as  saying 

The  end  is  everywhere, 
Art  still  has  truth,  take  refuge  there. 

Certainly  some  have  found  it  possible,  after  the  dis- 
integration of  belief  in  the  intellectual  and  moral 
sphere,  to  resist  further  loss  by  holding  fast  to  what 
can  be  proved  within  the  sphere  of  Art ;  and  they  have 
afterwards  found  some  help  in  the  solution  of  other 
problems  by  means  of  it.  The  light  which  it  casts 
on  the  central  inquiry  of  Theism,  I  hope  to  show  in  my 
second  volume. 

In  the  brief  analyses  which  follow — both  of  the  major 
and  the  minor  writers — I  have,  in  all  important  cases, 
added  a  critical  estimate  to  the  resume  given ;  and, 
unless  when  the  opposite  is  indicated  by  quotation 
marks,  my  account  of  the  theory,  the  treatise,  or  the 


xii  Preface 

essay  is  one  for  which  I  am  to  be  held  responsible,  and 
not  the  author.  Some  books  dealing  with  the  several 
Arts — Poetry,  Music,  Painting,  Architecture,  and  Sculp- 
ture— which  have  not  been  analysed,  will  be  referred 
to  in  the  subsequent  discussion  of  these  Arts  in  detail. 

A  Guide  to  the  Literature  of  SEsthetics^  by  Messrs. 
Gayley  and  Scott  (University  of  California),  containing 
a  mass  of  most  useful  bibliographical  information, 
reached  me  after  these  sheets  were  in  the  press  ;  and  an 
interesting  series  of  papers  of  a  similar  kind,  by  F.  W. 
Foster,  in  Notes  and  Queries^  8th  September  to  iyth 
November  1888,  has  only  just  become  known  to  me. 
The  perusal  of  these,  while  too  late  to  be  of  use  in  this 
volume,  has  shown  me  that  some  lacunae  remain,  especi- 
ally in  the  more  recent  literatures  of  Germany,  Italy,  and 
France ;  and  I  have  not  been  able  to  deal  with  that  of 
Russia,  though  aware  that  it  is  a  field  which  ought  to  be 
explored.  It  is  less  likely  that  works  of  importance  in 
ancient,  mediaeval,  or  modern  philosophy,  up  to  the  last 
decade,  have  been  overlooked. 

The  German  histories  of  '  Aesthetik '  are  more  ela- 
borate than  those  of  France,  or  any  that  we  possess  in 
England ;  but  in  this,  as  in  other  departments  of  Philo- 
sophy, German  writers  confine  themselves  in  the  main  to 
their  own  countrymen.  If  more  learned,  they  are  some- 
times less  catholic  than  the  historians  of  other  lands. 
From  the  tendency  to  dwell  too  much  on  one's  own 
literature,  few  can  escape  ;  and  while  it  has  been  my  aim 
to  study  the  philosophy  of  each  race  dispassionately,  and 
to  give  prominence  to  all,  it  will  be  found  that,  in  this 
volume,  the  British  section  is  longer  than  the  others. 

W.  K. 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 

PREFACE  ......   v-xii 

CHAP. 

I.  INTRODUCTORY  .....        i 

II.  PREHISTORIC  ORIGINS  .  ...        7 

III.  ORIENTAL  ART,  AND  SPECULATION 

1.  Egypt      .  .        12 

2.  Semitic  Tendencies          .  .  .  14 

3.  Asiatic  Art  .  .  .         •    .  .16 

IV.  THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  GREECE 

1.  Introductory        .  .  .  .18 

2.  Socrates  and  Plato  .  .  .  .22 

3.  Aristotle  .  .  .  .  -27 

V.  THE  NEOPLATONISTS 

1.  Plotinus  ....  -30 

2.  Proclus    .  .  .  .  .  33 

VI.  THE  GR^CO-ROMAN  PERIOD 

1.  Introductory        .              .  .  .              -35 

2.  Lucretius,  Virgil,  Cicero,  etc.  .  .             .36 

3.  Vitruvius  to  Philostratus  .  .       40 

VII.  MEDIEVALISM 

1.  The  Patristic  Writers      .  .  .  -43 

2.  The  Thirteenth  Century .  .  .  -44 

3.  The  Fifteenth  Century    .  .  .  .46 


xiv  Contents 

CHAP. 

VIII.  THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  GERMANY  PAGE 

1.  Leibnitz  to  Lessing          .             .  .  -5° 

2.  Mendelssohn  to  Kant      .             .  .  -55 

3.  Herder  to  Humboldt       .             .  .  -59 

4.  Schelling  to  Schleiermacher        .  .  -65 

5.  Hegel  to  Carriere             .             .  .                     70 

6.  Schopenhauer  and  Hartmann      .  .                     78 

7.  Lotze  to  Jungmann          .             .  .  .82 

8.  The  Literature  of  Denmark        .  .  .89 

IX.  THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  FRANCE 

1.  Descartes             .             .             .  ,                    91 

2.  Crousaz  to  Buffier             .             .  .  '94 

3.  Andre  to  Diderot             .             .  .  .100 

4.  Montesquieu  to  Cousin    .             .  .  .106 

5.  Lamennais  to  Jouffroy     .             .  .                   113 

6.  Swiss  writers  ;   Topffer  to  Cherbuliez      .  117 

7.  Leveque  to  Thore            .             .  .                   1 23 

8.  Veron,  Coster,  Vallet,  etc.           .  .  .130 

9.  Guyau,  etc.          .             .             .  .  .138 

X.  THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  ITALY 

1.  Leon  Battista  Alberti  to  J.  P.  Bellori      .  .     143 

2.  Rosmini  to  Mamiani        .             .  .  .146 

XI.  THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  HOLLAND        .  .  .     153 

XII.  THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  BRITAIN 

1.  Bacon  to  Hutcheson        .            .  .  .164 

2.  Berkeley  to  Hogarth        .             .  '.  .170 

3.  Burke  to  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds     .  .  .      175 

4.  Lord  Kaimes  to  Thomas  Reid     .  .  .182 

5.  Alison  to  W.  Thomson   .             .  .  .187 

6.  Erasmus  Darwin  to  S.  T.  Coleridge  .                   193 

7.  David  Wilkie  to  Sir  William  Hamilton  .  .     200 

8.  M' Vicar  to  George  Ramsay         .  .  .     208 

9.  Carlyle  to  Ruskin             .             .  .  .216 

10.  Lord  Lindsay  to  Professor  Bain  .  .  .     222 

11.  William  B.  Scott  to  Charles  Darwin       .  .     233 


Contents  xv 

CHAP. 

XII.  THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  BRITAIN  (continued}  PAGE 

12.  Herbert  Spencer  to  Mr.  Sully     .  .             .239 

13.  Canon  Mozley  to  Mr.  Grant  Allen  .     246 

14.  William  Morris  to  W.  P.  Ker     .  .     254 

15.  W.  G.  Collingwood  to  J.  A.  Symonds  .             .     259 

XIII.  THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  AMERICA 

1.  1815  to  1849   .     .     .  .     .269 

2.  1867  tO  1876    .       .       .  .       -273 

3.  1880  to  1890   .  .  277 
INDEX  .     .     .     .     .  .     .  283 


CHAPTER    I 

INTRODUCTORY 

To  present  even  an  outline  of  philosophical  opinion  on  the 
subject  of  the  Beautiful,  it  will  not  suffice  merely  to  state 
the  chief  theories  in  chronological  order,  presenting  them 
in  their  technical  framework.  Nor  will  it  be  possible  to 
proceed  by  way  of  exact  quotation  from  the  more  important 
treatises  that  have  come  down  to  us  from  antiquity. 
However  admirable  in  themselves,  literal  extracts — even 
from  the  greatest  writers  of  the  world — become,  like  the 
volumes  from  which  they  are  taken,  dry -as -dust.  A 
"golden  treasury"  of  disconnected  wisdom  soon  loses  its 
character,  and  becomes  one  of  iron  or  of  clay.  To 
deal  in  a  vital  manner  with  the  history  of  opinion  on  any 
subject,  it  is  necessary  to  show  how  theories  have  been 
evolved,  how  they  have  been  the  outcome  of  social  as  well 
as  of  intellectual  causes,  and  have  often  been  the  product  of 
obscure  phenomena  in  the  life  of  a  nation. 

In  the  department  of  ^Esthetics  especially,  many  germs 
of  subsequent  theory  will  be  found  in  the  primitive  Art  of 
the  world.  The  earliest  attempt  at  ornament  of  any  kind 
was  due  to  much  more  than  casual  fancy,  or  choice.  It 
was  the  result  of  a  real  perception  of  the  beautiful, 
however  rude  ;  while  each  success  in  embellishment  gave 
new  insight  to  the  worker.  After  many  efforts  and 
failures,  he  paused  to  reflect  on  his  work  ;  and  out  of  this 


2  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

reflex  process — doubling  back  on  the  primitive  perception 
of  Nature,  and  judging  critically  of  Ornament — the  earliest 
theorisings  as  to  Beauty  arose. 

In  the  poetry,  music,  and  art  of  each  nation  and  period 
we  have  evidence  that  the  general  mind  of  the  race  has 
from  the  first  been  struggling,  as  it  were,  with  ideas  on  the 
subject  of  the  Beautiful — ideas  which  it  has  never  been 
able  fully  to  grasp,  but  which  it  has  discerned  for  a  time, 
then  dropped  or  lost  sight  of,  under  the  pressure  of  other 
interests.  These  ideas  have  not  been  created  by  the  his- 
toric evolution  of  the  race.  They  have  been  with  it  from 
the  commencement  of  its  history,  although  they  have  some- 
times been  latent,  and  although  their  possessors  have  been 
often  quite  unconscious  of  them. 

In  those  countries  and  periods,  however,  in  which 
creative  Art  has  flourished  most,  the  criticism  of  Art  has 
been  most  fragmentary  and  least  adequate.  The  reason  is 
evident.  When  original  insight  is  present  and  active  in 
a  people,  it  sweeps  criticism  before  it,  as  a  hindrance  or 
an  irrelevancy ;  but  as  soon  as  the  flood  has  spent  itself, 
and  the  tide  begins  to  ebb,  reflection  upon  the  past  is 
natural  and  inevitable.  Men  proceed  to  take  stock  of  their 
inheritance,  and  to  appraise  what  they  cannot  now  produce. 
There  were  no  treatises  on  the  art  of  Sculpture,  for  example, 
written  in  the  age  of  Pericles  ;  and  no  criticism  of  the  art 
of  Painting  appeared  in  the  Medicean  period. 

It  is  worthy  of  remark  that  the  chief  artistic  periods 
in  history  have  not  been  the  most  notable,  morally  and 
politically.  An  appreciation  of  the  Beautiful  has  followed, 
rather  than  accompanied,  the  times  of  greatest  national 
aspiration  and  success.  It  has  sometimes  been  their  fruit. 
In  the  Athenian  and  Spartan  states,  so  long  as  political 
freedom  was  esteemed  the  most  precious  thing  a  nation  could 
enjoy,  and  so  long  as  the  struggle  for  it  lasted,  there  was 
much  less  interest  in  the  Beautiful  than  afterwards.  In  the 
Periclean  period,  when  the  old  robustness  had  died  out,  the 
appreciation  of  Art  set  in.  Similarly  in  Rome,  after  the 
stern  work  of  the  legions  had  ended,  when  law  and  order 
were  established,  a  certain  amount  of  effeminacy  was  the 


i  Introductory  3 

result  of  the  peace  that  followed ;  and  then  it  was  that 
the  appreciation  of  Art  was  greatest.  Parallel  illustra- 
tions may  easily  be  found,  both  in  oriental  and  in  modern 
history. 

It  is  almost  a  corollary  from  this  to  say  that  no  nation 
has  ever  been  at  the  time  aware  of  its  own  artistic  decline. 
Nay,  its  critics  and  art-workers  have  even  sometimes  inter- 
preted, what  posterity  has  seen  to  be  a  regress,  as  a  forward 
movement,  or  as  an  ascent.  This  remark  applies  to  national 
decadence,  not  only  in  Art,  but  also  in  every  other  direction 
— in  philosophy,  in  morals,  in  political  life,  and  in  religion. 

An  important  difference  between  the  history  of  ^Esthetics, 
and  that  of  almost  every  other  branch  of  philosophy  must, 
however,  be  pointed  out.  In  following  the  course  of  the 
logical  and  metaphysical  thought  of  the  world,  it  is  not 
necessary  to  take  account  of  all  the  co-operating  causes 
which  have  been  at  work  in  the  intellectual  life  of  each 
nation.  We  can  detach  the  speculative  effort  which  has 
been  directed  to  these  problems,  from  that  which  has  been 
bestowed  on  others,  without  injury  to  the  treatment  of  the 
former,  and  often  with  distinct  advantage.  It  is  true  that 
in  dealing  with  Ethics  we  must  always  take  into  account 
the  effect  of  moral  theory  on  practice,  and  on  social  life 
generally.  It  will  be  found  almost  impossible,  however, 
to  detach  the  history  of  the  philosophy  of  the  Beautiful 
from  the  theory  and  the  practice  of  the  several  Arts. 
The  evolution  of  speculative  thought  on  the  subject  of 
Beauty  is  mirrored  to  us  in  the  development  of  Art, 
and  it  is  thus  perhaps  that  its  tendencies  are  best 
understood.  We  see  the  working,  and  at  times  the 
fermenting  activity,  of  a  particular  aesthetic  theory  in  the 
subsequent  history  of  an  art -school,  and  not  only  in  the 
literature  of  a  period,  but  in  the  very  customs  of  society. 
The  two  are  so  closely  upbound  that  a  theory  of  Beauty  is 
at  the  same  time  a  doctrine  of  Art,  while  every  doctrine  of 
Art  is  based  upon  a  theory  as  to  the  nature  of  Beauty  ;  and 
the  history  of  the  two  run  on  parallel  lines,  and  often  on 
the  same  ones.  Being  thus  so  closely  kindred  in  origin, 
and  evolved  together,  it  is  evident  that  a  knowledge  of  the 


4  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

history  of  Art  is  essential  to  a  knowledge  of  the  theory  of 
Esthetics. 

In  the  historical  outlines  which  follow,  it  will  some- 
times be  found  that  a  philosophy  of  the  Beautiful  lies  by 
implication  within  a  speculative  system,  when  it  is  not  ex- 
plicitly announced.  Even  if  Plato  had  never  touched  the 
subject  in  any  of  his  dialogues,  it  would  have  been  possible, 
from  a  study  of  his  ideal  theory,  as  unfolded  in  the 
Thecetetus,  the  Sophist^  and  the  Parmenides,  to  foresee  more 
than  the  outward  form  which  a  philosophy  of  the  Beautiful 
would  assume,  in  any  school  which  drew  its  inspiration 
from  him.  St.  Augustine's  work  De  Apto  et  Pulchro  has 
perished,  but  we  can  without  difficulty  reconstruct  his 
theory  from  other  passages  in  his  writings.  The  sentences 
of  Thomas  Aquinas  on  the  subject  are  like  the  fragmentary 
bones  of  the  mammoth,  found  as  fossils  in  the  drift,  but  a 
whole  volume  may  be  written  (and  has  been)  on  his  doctrine 
de  pulchro.  Descartes  wrote  nothing  directly  on  the  sub- 
ject, nor  did  Leibnitz ;  but  neither  the  Cartesian  nor  the 
Leibnitzian  doctrine  on  the  nature  of  the  Beautiful  is 
difficult  to  find.  This  will  be  seen  more  fully  in  its  proper 
historical  place. 

It  will  be  further  seen  that  the  constancy  with  which 
the  two  great  schools  of  philosophical  thought  on  this 
subject  appear  and  reappear  in  history — in  every  country 
arising,  falling,  and  rising  again,  in  every  literature 
assuming  new  phases,  but  in  each  showing  themselves 
superior  to  the  assaults  that  seemed  for  a  time  to  over- 
throw them — is  the  best  evidence  that  there  is  a  funda- 
mental truth  at  the  heart  of  each,  as  well  as  an  integral 
place  for  ^Esthetics  within  the  hierarchy  of  the  sciences. 

Taking  then  the  history  of  opinion  on  the  subject  of  the 
Beautiful,  along  with  the  Art  which  has  reflected  it,  we 
might  roughly  divide  its  periods  as  follows.  (In  the  two 
first  what  we  have  chiefly  to  note  is  the  embodiment  of  the 
Beautiful  in  Art.  It  is  not  till  the  third  is  reached  that 
philosophical  reflection  upon  it  strictly  begins.)  (i)  The 
beginnings  of  Art,  as  seen  in  palaeolithic  ornament,  wood 
and  bone  carving,  and  decorative  work  of  all  kinds.  (2) 


i  Introductory  5 

Oriental  Art,  and  speculation  of  the  simplest  kind  ;  includ- 
ing, as  subsections,  (a)  the  Egyptian,  (b)  the  Semitic  or 
Hebrew,  (c)  the  Assyrian,  (d)  the  Persian,  (e)  the  Indian, 
(/)  the  Chinese,  and  (g}  the  Japanese.  (3)  The  Greek 
Philosophy  and  Art.  (4)  The  Alexandrian.  (5)  The  Grasco- 
Roman  period.  (6)  The  Mediaeval.  (7)  The  Philosophy  of 
Germany.  (8)  The  Philosophy  of  France,  including  that  of 
Switzerland.  (9)  The  Philosophy  of  Italy.  (10)  The 
Philosophy  of  Holland.  (n)  The  philosophical  writers 
and  literary  critics  of  Great  Britain  and  Ireland.  (12)  The 
Philosophy  of  America.  (13)  That  of  Denmark,  Russia, 
and  other  countries. 

It  is  scarcely  possible  to  exhibit  the  progress  of  philo- 
sophical theory  on  the  subject  of  the  Beautiful,  or  the 
progress  of  the  Art  which  has  embodied  it,  in  exact 
chronological  order,  by  merely  passing  from  century  to 
century,  and  noting  each  important  doctrine  or  treatise,  and 
each  great  art-product,  in  the  precise  order  of  their  appear- 
ance. If  this  could  be  done,  it  would  doubtless  show  how 
the  organic  thought  of  the  world  has  evolved  itself  along 
particular  lines.  In  thus  tracing  the  wider  evolution  of  the 
mind  of  the  race,  the  sequences  of  national  development 
would,  however,  be  lost  to  view ;  and  the  progress  of  the 
Philosophy  of  each  nation,  within  its  own  area,  and  its 
characteristic  type  of  Art,  are  quite  as  significant  as  is  the 
growth  of  organic  thought  and  cosmopolitan  art.  It  is 
therefore  every  way  most  convenient  to  deal  with  the 
history  of  opinion  within  broad  national  areas  successively. 
The  one  disadvantage  in  this  method  of  procedure  is  that 
if  we  follow  the  stream  of  doctrine  within  each  country 
from  its  beginning  to  its  close,  and  note  every  writer  of 
importance,  there  cannot  fail  to  be  occasional  repetitions. 
This  will  perhaps  be  forgiven  if  we  find  in  the  end  that, 
while  there  is  "  nothing  new  under  the  sun  " — alike  in  philo- 
sophical theory  and  in  artistic  work — in  another  sense 
everything  is  new,  in  virtue  of  the  local  phases  it  assumes, 
and  the  characteristics  which  mark  it  off,  both  from  its 
predecessors  and  its  successors. 

In  tracing  the  sequence  of  opinion  in  each  country  we 


6  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful       CHAP,  i 

must  note  the  influence  of  foreign  as  well  as  of  native 
thought.  German  speculation,  for  example,  told  directly 
upon  that  of  France,  in  the  development  of  the  type  of 
philosophy  which  arose  in  Paris  at  the  beginning  of  this 
century  ;  and  it  is  impossible  to  understand  the  intellectual 
position  of  Jouffroy  and  LeVeque  without  some  knowledge 
of  Kant,  Schelling,  and  Hegel.  The  affinity  of  genuine 
philosophy  in  all  ages,  and  the  solidarity  of  the  thought 
of  the  world,  are  nowhere  seen  more  clearly  than  in  the 
history  of  aesthetic  theory. 


CHAPTER    II 

PREHISTORIC   ORIGINS 
Primitive  Man 

So  far  back  as  we  can  go,  by  the  help  of  the  memorials 
which  survive,  and  by  the  further  light  of  analogical  infer- 
ence, it  would  seem  that  primitive  man  had  a  real,  although 
a  dim  and  rudimentary,  appreciation  of  the  Beautiful.  As 
soon  as  the  qualities  of  objects  were  perceived,  as  distinct 
from  their  quantity  or  bulk,  their  aesthetic  side  was  also 
noted.  Beauty  was  recognised  as  a  fact,  and  efforts  were 
even  made  to  reproduce  it  in  ornament,  in  a  rude  sort  of 
way.  Accepting  the  analogy  between  the  development  of 
the  faculties  of  a  child,  and  the  evolution  of  the  race  at  large, 
we  may  trace  in  the  infantile  stage  of  the  latter  a  love  of 
brilliance,  of  warmth,  and  of  vivid  contrasts  of  all  sorts,  alike 
in  colour  and  in  sound.  Bright  flowers,  gaily  plumaged 
birds,  clear  strong  notes,  and  all  natural  products  that  were 
vivid  (whatever  their  other  features),  attracted  primitive 
man,  apart  from  their  utility.  No  doubt  the  discernment 
of  use  would  enhance  the  sense  of  beauty  at  the  very  outset  ; 
but,  from  the  first,  use  was  not  the  sole  interest  or  the 
primary  charm  ;  it  was  only  a  secondary  and  an  accessory 
one. 

It  is  not  difficult  to  imagine  a  savage — at  the  time  when 
his  home  was  a  cave  or  a  forest  grove — amusing  himself 
in  the  bright  weather  by  imitating  the  voices  of  birds,  or 
by  scratching  rude  outlines  of  them,  and  of  other  animals, 
on  the  walls  of  his  dwelling,  or  on  the  rock -faces  around. 


8  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

It  would  be  the  natural  outcome  of  a  joyous  mood  of  feeling 
on  a  bright  day ;  and  the  excitement  of  the  play-impulse — 
the  spiel-trieb,  of  which  Schiller  makes  so  much  in  his 
^Esthetic  Letters — would  urge  him  on.  The  recognition  of 
the  Beauty  of  Nature,  however,  springs  from  a  source  much 
deeper  than  this  spiel-trieb ;  and  there  cannot  be  a  doubt 
that  prehistoric  man  showed  a  real  appreciation  of  orna- 
mental forms.  The  representation  of  animal  and  vegetable 
products — such  as  the  antlers  of  deer,  and  the  leaves  of 
plants  and  trees — on  the  sides  of  the  cave -dwellings  is 
proof  of  this.  Probably  the  appreciation  of  colour  was  still 
earlier,  although  no  record  of  it  survives  ;  but  on  their  flint- 
arrows  and  the  handles  of  their  knives  there  were  rude 
attempts  at  carving,  or  decorative  ornament,  of  a  purely 
imitative  kind.  It  was  most  natural  that  the  bravest  or 
most  honoured  in  a  tribe  of  savages,  the  primitive  chief, 
should  wish  to  possess  some  mark  of  distinction,  that  he 
should  wear  as  a  trophy  some  memorial  of  an  animal  slain 
(a  feather  or  a  horn),  and  that  he  should  have  his  weapons 
made  ornamental  as  well  as  useful.  The  most  useful  shape 
for  the  primitive  weapon  would  first  be  discovered,  and  that 
it  should  afterwards  be  ornamented,  if  the  ornament  did  not 
lessen  the  use,  followed  almost  as  a  matter  of  course. 

The  absence  of  highly  developed  art  in  the  memorials 
of  primitive  man  has  been  taken  as  an  evidence  against 
the  descent,  and  in  favour  of  the  ascent  of  the  race.  It 
has  been  said  that  had  we  "  lapsed  from  higher  place," 
the  art  of  the  primitive  world  would  have  been  more 
perfect  than  any  that  the  world  has  subsequently  known. 
Be  this  as  it  may,  it  is  evident  that  to  the  rudimentary 
instinct  of  self-preservation — which  was  at  work  from  the 
first — there  was  added  very  early  the  instinct  of  adornment 
or  beautification.  These  two  instincts  have  always  worked 
together,  although  the  second  was  longer  in  becoming 
visible.  Its  development  may  have  been  delayed  until  it 
was  quickened  by  the  rise  of  a  new  want.  As  is  well  known, 
the  higher  any  organism  is,  the  more  numerous  are  its 
wants.  As  they  multiply,  they  vary  ;  and  as  they  vary,  they 
become  refined.  Primitive  man,  engaged  mainly  in  the 


ii  Prehistoric  Origins  9 

struggle  for  existence,  was  not  highly  intellectual.  He  had 
comparatively  few  things  to  record  beyond  his  efforts  at 
self-maintenance,  and  no  great  variety  of  feelings  to  express. 
Neither  intellect  nor  emotion  was  as  yet  evolved  into  com- 
plexity ;  but  as  soon  as  their  evolution  began,  with  the 
growth  of  mind  came  differentiation  of  faculty,  and  it  was 
only  to  be  expected  that  the  play-impulse  and  the  art-impulse 
would  be  evolved  together  as  twin  tendencies,  and  that  the 
cave  -  dwellers  should  amuse  themselves  by  carving  and 
decoration,  as  much  as  by  dance  and  song. 

Primitive  art  was  to  a  certain  extent  an  imitation  of 
Nature,  but  while  imitation  guided  it,  the  copying  became 
creative.  Its  purpose  was  to  produce  something  which  the 
mere  looking  on  Nature  did  not  yield,  else  why  have  copied 
it  ?  Why  not  have  been  content  with  gazing  at,  or  with  hand- 
ling, the  things  copied  ?  From  its  earliest  phases,  in  tracing 
rude  outlines  of  figures  on  walls,  to  the  carving  of  wood 
and  bone  with  flint-knives,  from  this  to  the  moulding  of 
vessels  in  clay,  or  the  twisting  of  vegetable  fibre  into  baskets, 
and  thence  to  primitive  metal  work,  not  only  did  use  direct 
the  art  of  savages,  but  a  sense  of  ornament  also  guided  it. 

Another  element  seems  to  have  been  conjoined  with  this, 
somewhat  early  in  the  history  of  man.  As  nature-worship 
was  probably  one  of  the  earliest  forms  of  religion,  primitive 
art  represented  Nature  for  a  religious  purpose,  and  of 
necessity  made  use  of  symbols.  This,  however,  was  not 
developed  to  any  great  extent,  until  we  reach  the  historic 
period  ;  and,  so  far  as  surviving  memorials  guide  us  in  our 
reading  of  history,  the  principal  thing  to  be  noted  in  the  art 
of  savages  is  that  at  a  very  early  period  a  sense  of  beauty 
was  added  to  that  of  utility.  Occasionally,  though  rarely, 
the  use  was  lessened  by  the  ornament ;  more  frequently  the 
beauty  was  sacrificed  to  the  use.  Ornament,  however,  was 
seldom  thrust  in  unnecessarily.  It  was  put  in  for  a  pur- 
pose, and  left  to  tell  its  own  tale  ;  while  an  artistic  spirit 
is  sometimes  seen,  even  in  the  way  in  which  things  were 
left  unfinished. 

Mr.  Andrew  Lang  is  of  opinion  that  the  theory  of  the 
earliest  Art  being  "the  disinterested  expression  of  the 


io  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

imitative  faculty,"  is  "  scarcely  warranted  by  the  little  we 
know  of  art's  beginnings  "  (Custom  and  Myth,  p.  276).  The 
earliest  art  was,  he  thinks,  decorative  rather  than  imitative  ; 
and  he  points  out  that  some  aboriginal  races  distinguish 
their  families  by  plants  or  animals,  from  which  they  fancy 
they  have  sprung,  and  that  they  occasionally  blazon  their 
shields  or  tattoo  their  breasts  with  images  of  these  creatures 
— which  custom  he  thinks  may  be  the  origin  of  heraldry. 
That  primitive  art  was  never  imitative  for  any  other  than  a 
practical  purpose,  may  perhaps  be  an  extreme  position.  It 
is  difficult  to  see  why  the  palaeolithic  men  of  the  Dordogne 
should,  50,000  years  ago,  have  carved  figures  of  the  reindeer 
on  their  knife-handles  for  a  purely  practical  purpose.  The 
ornament  did  not  help  them  in  the  subsequent  use  of  the 
knife.  May  not  some  real  perception  of  beauty  of  form, 
a  desire  to  copy  it,  and  to  retain  it  because  it  was  "a 
thing  of  beauty  "  as  well  as  a  successful  copy,  have  guided 
them  from  the  first  ? 

All  that  Mr.  Edward  B.  Tylor  has  written  on  the  subject 
of  Primitive  Man  is  worthy  of  special  consideration.  In 
1890  he  wrote:  "We  are  not  yet  in  a  position  to  say 
anything  clear  and  definite  as  to  the  principles  of  beauty 
as  apprehended  by  primitive  man.  The  savages  who  re- 
present primitive  man,  like  the  mammoth  period  men,  show 
clearly  by  their  artistic  works  that  they  had  ideas  of  what 
was  beautiful,  but  we  do  not  know  what  led  them  to  think 
their  ornamental  patterns  beautiful.  I  do  not  even  know 
what  led  them  to  think  a  necklace  of  berries,  or  a  feather 
in  their  nose,  a  beautiful  appendage.  At  the  Pitt  Rivers 
Museum  we  are  working  out  some  evidence  that  orna- 
ments are  often  broken-down  representations  of  men, 
dogs,  cords,  plaiting,  etc.,  with  a  sense  rather  of  utility  than 
of  decoration." 

To  this  may  be  added  what  Mr.  Owen  Jones  has  said  of 
savage  ornament :  "  The  ornament  of  a  savage  tribe,  being 
the  result  of  a  natural  instinct,  is  necessarily  always  true  to 
its  purpose  ;  whilst  in  much  of  the  ornament  of  civilised 
nations,  the  first  impulse  which  generated  received  forms 
being  enfeebled  by  constant  repetition,  the  ornament  is 


ii  Prehistoric  Origins  u 

oftentimes  misapplied,  and  instead  of  first  seeking  the  most 
convenient  form,  and  adding  beauty,  all  beauty  is  destroyed, 
because  all  fitness,  by  superadding  ornament  to  ill-contrived 
form.  If  we  would  return  to  a  more  healthy  condition,  we 
must  even  be  as  little  children,  or  as  savages  ;  we  must  get 
rid  of  the  acquired  and  artificial,  and  return  to  and  develop 
natural  instincts"  (Grammar  of  Ornament,  p.  16). 


CHAPTER    III 

ORIENTAL    ART,    AND    SPECULATION 
I.   Egypt 

A  WIDE  interval  separates  the  art-work  of  prehistoric  man 
from  the  earliest  known  relics  of  the  Egyptian  and  Assyrian 
artists  ;  and  the  links  of  connection  between  the  two  are 
irreparably  lost.  In  examining  what  survives,  we  start 
with  a  really  high  state  of  civilisation.  At  the  very  dawn  of 
history,  both  in  Egypt  and  Assyria,  Architecture  is  already 
developed  on  a  colossal  scale,  alike  in  Pyramid  and  Temple, 
with  statues  corresponding.  We  find  sculptured  walls  and 
painted  tombs.  We  find  picture-writing,  and  hieroglyphics 
of  many  kinds,  on  slab  and  column  •  while  in  Egypt  there 
was  certainly  some  appreciation  of  landscape  beauty.  In 
pictures  which  still  survive,  we  have  representations  of 
houses  with  gardens  attached,  containing  ponds,  and  parks 
with  game-preserves,  in  which  the  element  of  beauty  is  as 
evident  as  that  of  utility. 

In  the  remarkable  Egyptian  figure  of  the  scribe,  now  in 
the  Louvre,  the  pupils  of  the  eyes  are  formed  of  rock- 
crystal,  placed  in  white  quartz.  He  is  represented  as  look- 
ing up  to  a  speaker  ;  and  the  expression  of  the  countenance 
is  not  much  inferior  to  that  of  the  best  Greek  statues.  It 
belongs  probably  to  the  period  of  the  sixth  dynasty.  Such 
a  work  of  art,  however,  is  exceptional ;  and  it  is  to  be 
observed  that,  as  a  rule,  the  artist  was  not  honoured  in  Egypt, 
as  he  came  to  be  in  Greece.  He  was  usually  one  of  the 
working  class.  The  artist  was  lost  in  the  house-painter  or 


CHAP,  in       Oriental  Art,  and  Speculation  13 

decorator,  the  architect  in  the  mason  or  builder.  This 
may  partly  explain  the  monotony  and  the  repetition  which 
characterise  Egyptian  art.  Its  features  were  stereotyped  (the 
lotus-flower,  for  example),  and  copied  mechanically  for  ages. 

While  the  earliest  surviving  art  of  Egypt  is  the  most 
perfect,  Mr.  Owen  Jones  is  of  opinion  that  all  that  remains 
shows  it  to  us  in  a  state  of  decline  ;  and  that  monuments 
which  were  set  up  2000  years  B.C.  are  only  the  ruins  of 
more  perfect  ones.  He  thinks  that  the  earliest  known  Art 
of  Egypt  is  inferior  to  the  still  earlier  unknown  Art,  and 
that  "  the  Egyptians  were  inferior  only  to  themselves " 
(Grammar  of  Ornament,  p.  22).  This  judgment  is  more 
than  doubtful,  but  in  connection  with  it,  it  is  worthy  of 
note  that  we  find  no  trace  of  foreign  influence  at  work  in 
Egyptian  Art.  Its  primary  root  seems  to  have  been  the 
imitation  of  a  few  natural  forms,  which  were  immensely 
varied  (and  to  that  extent  idealised),  but  in  the  main  always 
true,  and  always  symbolic. 

The  animal-worship  of  Egypt  perhaps  fostered  the  re- 
cognition of  the  beautiful ;  but  it  is  to  be  observed  that,  to 
the  Egyptians,  the  divine  element  in  the  world  was  seen  in 
life  simply  as  such,  not  in  the  characteristics  of  life.  They 
appreciated  quantity  rather  than  quality ;  and  we  find  no 
trace  among  the  populace  of  delight  in  Beauty,  certainly 
no  enthusiasm  for  it ;  while  the  Sublime  in  Nature  seems 
to  have  awakened  a  feeling  of  awe  and  repulsion,  rather 
than  of  attraction. 

The  decorative  art  of  Egypt  was  chiefly  used,  not  to 
ornament  the  house,  but  to  enrich  the  Temple,  and  there 
is,  in  consequence,  a  certain  austere  gravity  and  severity 
in  it,  which  contrasts  notably  with  the  ease,  the  freedom, 
the  lightness,  and  the  grace  of  Greek  art.  Like  the  enig- 
matical sphinx,  it  is  massive,  ponderous,  mysteriously  great. 
It  was  drawn,  it  is  true,  from  Nature  ;  but  in  Egypt  Nature 
dominated  over  man.  The  stupendous  river,  with  its  mys- 
terious annual  flood,  and  the  not  infrequent  sand-storms 
from  the  desert,  made  him  feel  his  insignificance  in  a  way 
in  which  it  was  impossible  for  any  one  to  feel  it  in  Greece, 
or  even  in  Palestine.  But — as  a  compensation  for  this — 


14  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

there  is,  in  all  the  art  of  Egypt,  an  explicit  recognition  of  a 
sphere  beyond  the  visible,  and  of  an  existence  above  the 
merely  phenomenal  life  of  the  present. 

One  of  the  most  accomplished  of  Egyptologists,  Mr. 
Edouard  Naville  of  Geneva,  assures  me  that  there  is  no 
Egyptian  writing  bearing  on  the  subject  of  the  Beautiful,  in 
the  abstract,  apart  from  the  concrete  objects,  in  which  the 
artists  of  the  country  have  tried  to  realise  their  conceptions 
of  it.  This  is  precisely  what  we  would  expect  a  priori. 
The  first  Egyptian  philosophising  on  the  subject  was  in  the 
Neoplatonic  school  at  Alexandria. 


2.   Semitic  Tendencies 

Within  the  Semitic  race  a  higher  note  was  struck.  There 
was  probably  a  greater  appreciation,  both  of  the  beautiful 
and  the  sublime,  in  Palestine,  than  in  any  other  country  to 
the  east  of  Greece.  Evidence  of  this  will  be  found  in  the 
Hebrew  books,  especially  in  the  Psalter,  the  Book  of  Job, 
the  Song  of  Solomon,  and  the  writings  of  some  of  the 
prophets.  It  is  of  course  only  in  stray  passages  that  it 
comes  out,  but  these  passages  show  that  the  finer  spirits  of 
the  Jewish  race  had  a  perception  of  Beauty,  and  could 
record  it  in  a  way  that  is  not  surpassed  in  the  contempor- 
aneous literature  of  the  West.  On  the  other  hand,  we  have 
no  evidence  that  Nature  was  appreciated  by  the  Hebrews 
for  its  own  sake.  It  was  chiefly  valued  as  yielding  a  series 
of  illustrations  or  revelations  of  a  higher  Nature  detached 
from  it,  and  yet  controlling  it.  It  was  thought  of  as  an 
area,  the  separate  provinces  of  which  were  inhabited,  not 
by  a  multitude  of  deities,  but  by  one,  and  that  one  "  half 
concealed  and  half  revealed  "  within  it.  It  was  a  vast  and 
varied  keyboard,  touched  at  intervals  by  the  hands  of  an 
unseen  player.  This  gave  a  character  of  its  own  to  the 
Hebrew  poetry.  It  was  dualistic  and  anti-pantheistic  to 
the  core. 

It  is  equally  important  to  note  that  Beauty  was  intro- 
duced,  as  decorative  Art,  into  the  forefront  of  the  Jewish 


in  Oriental  Art)  and  Speculation  15 

religion,  and  became  the  close  ally,  if  not  an  essential  part 
of  its  ritual.  "  Cunning  workmanship  "  in  architecture,  as 
well  as  in  the  construction  of  utensils  for  the  temple-service, 
splendour  in  decorative  work — ornament,  in  short — was  a 
necessary  adjunct  of  the  ceremonial. 

But  the  average  Hebrew  mind  had  no  appreciation  of 
the  Beauty  of  Nature  for  its  own  sake.  If  the  peasantry 
ever  thought  of  such  things  as  "the  sweet  influence  of 
the  Pleiades,"  it  would  be  from  some  utilitarian  reason 
connected  with  their  life  as  agriculturists.  If  the  reli- 
giously disposed  ever  really  "considered  the  lilies  of  the 
field,"  it  was  as  a  parable  conveying  some  lesson  for 
themselves.  It  is  easy  to  see  why  a  race  expressly  for- 
bidden to  make  use  of  "  graven  images,"  and  constitu- 
tionally apt  to  take  "  the  sign  for  the  thing  signified," 
should  not  have  attained  to  the  distinction  of  others  (of  the 
Greeks,  for  example)  in  Sculpture.  The  finest  statuary  of 
the  age  of  Phidias,  supposing  it  to  have  been  transferred 
to  Palestine,  would  probably  have  been  broken  to  pieces  by 
the  people  in  a  fit  of  solemn  wrath,  at  the  instigation  of  one 
of  their  prophets.  But  it  is  less  easy  to  explain  the  want 
of  an  appreciation  of  simple  Beauty  in  the  world  of  sight 
and  sound.  In  its  physical  features  Palestine  in  some 
respects  resembled  Greece.  It  was  "  a  land  of  fountains 
and  depths,  that  spring  out  of  valleys  and  hills  "  ;  but  the 
charm  of  the  green  earth  and  the  silent  sky,  the  glory  of 
sunrise  and  sunset,  seem  to  have  been  little  felt ;  while  the 
sublimest  ravine  in  the  hill  country  was  to  the  popular 
imagination  but  "the  valley  of  the  shadow  of  death."  We 
may  perhaps  account  for  it  when  we  recollect  that  the  main 
element  in  the  education  of  the  Hebrew  race  was  the 
recognition  of  a  Power  superior  to  Nature,  and  controlling 
it.  Hence  it  was  an  ethical,  not  an  aesthetic  idea  that  held 
the  central  place  in  Palestine,  and  ruled  the  life  of  the 
nation.  The  chief  function  of  the  teacher,  or  prophet,  was 
to  restrain  the  people  in  their  tendency  to  sink  from  the 
moral  toward  the  ceremonial  ;  and  it  is  worthy  of  note 
that,  when  he  failed,  and  the  people  resorted  to  image- 
worship,  those  which  they  constructed  were  not  beautiful. 


1 6  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

This  want  of  beauty  in  the  images  used  in  religious 
worship  applies,  however,  to  the  orientals  generally. 
Scarcely  one  of  them,  in  Assyria  or  India,  had  any  beauty. 
It  may  have  been  partly  due  to  the  way  in  which  the  god 
was  separated  from  the  element  over  which  he  was 
supposed  to  preside,  or  to  control.  There  was  a  cleft  in 
the  popular  imagination  between  natural  objects  and  the 
powers  that  were  supposed  to  inhabit  them.  Had  there 
been  a  closer  identification  of  the  two,  and  the  Divinity 
been  regarded  as  the  very  soul  of  the  element,  the  "  graven 
images  "  might  have  been  truer  to  Nature. 


3.  Asiatic  Art 

The  Assyrian  and  Babylonian  Art  was  not  original,  pro- 
gressive, or  specially  distinctive.  It  was  artificial,  borrowed, 
and  retrograde.  It  was  an  Egyptian  development,  but  it 
was  a  copy  of  Egypt,  not  in  its  prime,  but  in  its  decadence. 
Besides,  it  was  conventionalised  in  the  effort  to  convey 
instruction.  This  is  usually  the  case  whenever  Art  becomes 
a  homily,  or  is  designed  with  a  view  to  teach  lessons  to 
the  people. 

The  Art  of  Persia  again,  perhaps  also  derived  originally 
from  Egypt,  and  some  of  it  transmitted  through  Assyria, 
worked  itself  clear  of  the  rigidity  of  the  former,  and  the 
mannerism  of  the  latter.  In  decorative  work,  in  Painting 
as  well  as  in  Ornament,  and  in  Poetry  as  well  as  in 
Painting,  the  genius  of  the  Persian  race,  while  receiving 
ideas  from  outside  and  assimilating  them,  has  taken  a  line  of 
its  own,  in  which  beauty  predominates.  This,  however,  is 
a  relatively  late  feature  in  the  art  of  Persia.  In  the  earlier 
times,  the  sense  of  Beauty  slumbered,  as  it  did  in  India, 
and  amongst  the  Aryan  races  generally.  It  is  perhaps  the 
more  remarkable  that  it  should  not  have  awakened  earlier 
in  India,  when  we  remember  that  almost  all  the  distinctive 
types  of  philosophical  thought  had  sprung  up,  that  a 
monistic  as  well  as  a  dualistic  conception  of  the  world 
prevailed  alongside  of  the  popular  polytheism  and  nature- 


in  Oriental  Art)  and  Speculation  17 

worship.  But  there  is  scarcely  a  trace  of  a  feeling  for  the 
Beautiful  in  the  Brahminical  or  Buddhist  writings.  The 
testimony  of  Professor  Max  Miiller  on  this  point  is  more 
valuable  than  the  conjectures  of  those  who  cannot  speak 
with  his  authority.  In  June  1890  he  wrote  : — 

' '  The  question  which  you  ask  has  occupied  my  mind  for  many 
years.  I  remember  Humboldt,  when  he  was  writing  his  A'osmos, 
asking  me  what  the  Indians  thought  of  the  Beautiful  in  Nature.  I 
gave  him  several  descriptions  of  Nature,  which  I  believe  he  published, 
but  I  had  to  tell  him  that  the  idea  of  the  Beautiful  in  Nature  did  not 
exist  in  the  Hindu  mind.  It  is  the  same  with  their  descriptions 
of  human  beauty.  They  describe  what  they  .saw,  they  praise 
certain  features  ;  they  compare  them  with  other  features  in  Nature  ; 
but  the  Beautiful  as  such  does  not  exist  for  them.  They  never 
excelled  either  in  sculpture  or  painting.  Their  sculpture  is  meant 
to  express  thought,  and  they  do  not  mind  giving  a  god  ever  so 
many  arms  to  indicate  his  omnipotence.  When  painting  comes  in, 
they  simply  admire  its  mirroring  and  life-likeness.  With  regard  to 
actions,  again,  they  speak  of  them  as  good  or  bad,  brave  or  mean, 
but  never  as  simply  beautiful.  ...  It  would  be  quite  impossible 
to  render  rb  Ka\6v  in  Sanskrit.  Beautiful,  sobhana,  means  bright ; 
pesala,  variegated  ;  ramantya,  pleasant.  The  beauty  of  poetry  is 
expressed  by  madhflni,  the  sweet  things  ;  the  beauty  of  Nature  by 
sobhd,  splendour.  Of  course  there  is  a  goddess  of  beauty,  Srt,  and 
Lakshmti  but  they  are  both  late,  and  they  represent  happiness 
rather  than  simple  beauty.  Even  this  negative  evidence  may  be 
useful  as  showing  what  is  essential  for  the  development  of  the 
concept  of  the  Beautiful.  But  it  is  strange,  nevertheless,  that  a 
people  so  fond  of  the  highest  abstractions  as  the  Hindus,  should 
never  have  summarised  their  perceptions  of  the  Beautiful.  I  wish 
I  could  have  given  you  a  more  satisfactory  answer,  but  ein  Schelm 
giebt  mehr  als  er  hat. 

"F.  MAX  MULLER." 

With  this  quotation  from  Mr.  Max  Miiller  we  may 
return  from  the  East  to  Europe.  The  large  questions 
involved  in  the  development  of  Turanian  Art,  its  history  in 
China  and  Japan,  can  only  be  dealt  with  by  specialists  ; 
but  while  the  story  of  the  evolution  of  the  sense  of  beauty 
and  of  the  art-spirit  in  these  lands  is  extremely  interesting, 
we  have  no  analysis  of  it  in  their  literature,  no  philosophy  of 
the  Beautiful. 


CHAPTER    IV 

THE    PHILOSOPHY    OF    GREECE 

i.  Introductory 

ONE  of  the  chief  contrasts  between  the  oriental  and  the 
western  Art  of  the  world  is  that  the  former  has  been  so 
much  more  stationary  than  the  latter.  It  has  moved 
slowly,  austerely,  and  in  a  narrow  groove  ;  while  with  the 
austerity  and  narrowness  the  orientals  have  been  content. 
Their  artists  have  worked  on  from  generation  to  generation 
in  a  mechanical  fashion,  repeating  old  designs,  alike  un- 
conscious of  the  theory  of  their  own  work,  and  ignorant  of 
that  of  other  nations.  They  have  not  reflected  on  their 
procedure,  and  could  give  no  theoretical  account  of  it. 
The  western  spirit,  on  the  contrary,  has  been  usually 
active,  and  sometimes  restless.  Hence  its  Art  develop- 
ments have  been  more  rapid,  and  various,  than  those  of  the 
East.  They  have  gone  through  several  cycles  of  rise, 
decline,  and  fall ;  and  all  the  while  the  mind  of  Europe 
has  speculated  upon  its  work,  and  evolved  art-theories  in 
number. 

The  two  great  art -periods  in  European  history  have 
been  that  of  Greece  in  the  age  of  Pericles,  and  that  of  the 
Italian  Renaissance  in  the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centuries  ; 
but  the  philosophical  tendency  that  underlay  these  periods 
has  been  very  different.  It  may  perhaps  be  said  that,  in 
the  former,  synthesis  prevailed  over  analysis  ;  while,  in  the 
latter,  analysis  has  predominated.  The  tendency  in  Greece 
almost  from  the  first  was  a  tendency  to  unite,  or  combine 


CHAP,  iv  TJte  Philosophy  of  Greece  19 

details  in  a  harmonious  whole.  The  tendency  of  the 
modern  world,  on  the  contrary,  has  been  to  divide,  and  to 
subdivide,  till  it  has  almost  missed  the  unity  that  underlies 
division. 

Generalisations  are,  however,  very  often  deceptive,  and 
it  is  always  wise  to  test  them  by  a  subsequent  examination 
of  the  facts  on  which  they  are  based. 

In  doing  so  in  this  case,  it  is  desirable  to  note  that  the 
monism  of  Greece — which  was  the  prevailing  type  of  its 
philosophical  thought — inasmuch  as  each  philosopher  took 
his  one  principle  as  explanatory  of  the  whole  of  Nature — 
was  quite  consistent  with  the  recognition  of  Beauty,  as  an 
objective  reality.  Pervading  the  universe  as  a  whole,  it 
was  supposed  to  have  localised  itself  (as  it  were)  in  certain 
places  and  in  certain  things.  But  it  was  a  sense  of  the 
unity  and  ultimate  identity  of  all  the  particular  things 
which  reveal  the  Beautiful — in  virtue  of  the  elements  they 
possess  in  common — which  underlay  the  consciousness  of 
the  Hellenic  race,  felt  rather  than  expressed,  that  dis- 
tinguished it  from  others.  Probably  no  nation  ever  felt 
that  the  True,  the  Beautiful,  and  the  Good  are  one,  in  the 
same  simple  instinctive  way  that  the  Greeks  felt  it ;  and 
the  philosophical  conviction  that  everything  true  is  also 
beautiful  at  its  root,  and  that  everything  beautiful  is  also 
essentially  good,  must  have  greatly  quickened  the  aesthetic 
sense  of  the  nation. 

It  is  more  than  doubtful  if  any  modern  nation  has 
had  the  same  delicacy  of  perception  and  even  sensitiveness 
to  Beauty  as  the  Greeks  had  ;  and  it  is  probable  that  the 
intellectual  ideas  of  the  people  had  a  good  deal  to  do  with 
this.  The  sense  of  symmetry  and  proportion,  of  order,  and 
moderated  energy,  was  constitutional  with  them  ;  and  we 
find  it  embodied  in  their  architecture,  illustrated  in  their 
sculpture,  and  the  very  soul  of  their  poetry.  We  see  it  in 
their  daily  life  and  institutions,  in  their  games,  nay,  even  in 
the  construction  of  their  philosophical  systems.  Perhaps  the 
most  significant  thing  about  it  is  that  the  greatest  results  were 
reached  with  scarce  a  sign  of  effort.  The  instinctive  way  in 
which  its  great  artists  went  straight  from  the  actual  world, 


20  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

with  its  multitudinous  types  and  symbols,  to  a  world  that  tran- 
scended it,  made  Greece  pre-eminently  the  land  of  the  ideal. 
It  is  an  extremely  interesting,  and  a  very  difficult,  ques- 
tion in  historical  criticism  how  this  characteristic  of  the 
Greek  civilisation  was  produced.  Many  causes  doubtless 
co-operated  to  bring  it  about  It  was  partly  due  to  the 
inherent  vigour  of  the  earliest  settlers  on  the  peninsula  of 
Hellas,  and  to  the  mingling  of  diverse  races,  as  wave 
after  wave  of  population,  and  of  conquest,  swept  westwards 
from  the  old  home  of  the  Aryans,  or  southwards  from 
a  European  source.  Climatical  causes  would  co-operate 
with  those  of  race.  The  physical  features  of  the  land,  its 
usually  serene  climate,  reacted  on  the  people  ;  and  the 
result  was  that  in  Greece  Nature  in  no  sense  subdued  man. 
On  the  contrary,  man  very  easily  became  the  interpreter 
of  Nature,  and  the  deft  manipulator  of  her  forms.  The 
natural  affinity  of  the  Greek  mind  with  excellence  of  every 
kind,  and  its  rapid  assimilative  power,  must  also  be  taken 
into  account.  Athens  had  an  eye  always  open  to  the  East ; 
and  it  received  influence  both  from  Syria  and  from  Egypt. 

The  development  of  the  most  distinctive  features  of  the 
nation  was,  however,  more  an  evolution  from  within  than 
a  graft  from  without.  Physically  the  Greeks  were  more 
beautiful  than  any  of  their  contemporaries.  Their  gymnas- 
tics doubtless  helped  to  strengthen  their  physical  type,  and 
the  race  had  a  passion  for  the  possession  of  Beauty.  There 
were  "  contests  for  Beauty,"  both  amongst  the  men  and  the 
women  of  Hellas  ;  while  the  national  honour  given  to  the 
artists  of  the  beautiful,  in  contrast  with  the  menial  rank  of 
these  men  in  other  lands,  helped  forward  the  appreciation 
of  the  people.  A  sophist  might  be  despised,  but  a  great 
Greek  sculptor  was  honoured  of  gods  and  men.  Partly  for 
this  reason,  the  beautiful  and  the  useful  were  identified  in 
the  popular  mind. 

It  must  also  be  remembered  that  each  one  of  the  arts, 
as  it  rose  into  eminence,  helped  the  others  that  had  pre- 
ceded, or  were  contemporaneous  with  it.  The  poetry  of 
Greece  reacted  on  its  painting,  its  sculpture,  and  its  archi- 
tecture ;  and  the  several  arts  reacted  on  the  public  life  of 


iv  The  Philosophy  of  Greece  21 

the  nation.  The  Panathenaic  procession  was  an  epitome 
of  all  that  was  most  characteristic  of  the  race,  and  the 
frieze  of  the  Parthenon,  on  which  that  procession  was 
represented  by  Phidias,  is  the  most  splendid  specimen  of 
the  art  of  Greece. 

Through  the  mingling  of  the  diverse  elements  that 
entered  into  the  Hellenic  character — each  holding  the 
other  in  check — the  culture  of  the  nation  became  many- 
sided  and  harmonious.  National  symmetry  was  its  out- 
come ;  and  the  beauty  which  lies  in  moderation,  or  the 
golden  mean  between  extremes,  was  not  only  the  aim  of 
the  artists,  but  it  was  also  to  a  very  large  extent  reflected 
in  the  social  life  of  the  people. 

It  may  also  be  noted  that  imagination  and  reason 
were  combined  in  Greece  as  they  had  never  been  com- 
bined before.  It  was  not  the  love  of  Beauty  alone  that 
fired  the  imagination  of  the  Greeks.  The  speculative 
instinct  was  also  at  work  ;  and,  as  the  people  delighted  in 
clear  intellectual  views,  as  well  as  in  agile  mental  move- 
ment of  all  sorts,  they  could  not  fail  to  direct  the  latter  to 
the  problem  of  Beauty.  Beauty  was  everywhere  before 
their  eyes,  in  their  daily  life  ;  and  into  all  their  temple 
worship  it  entered,  as  an  absolutely  necessary  element. 
They  could  not  understand  a  religion  from  which  the 
beautiful  was  absent ;  and  it  had  a  place  in  their  marketing 
and  games,  as  well  as  their  conflicts  by  sea  and  land. 

It  was  therefore  to  be  expected  that  in  Greece  we 
should  find  the  beginnings  of  a  literature  of  ./Esthetics  ;  but 
it  is  only  a  beginning  that  we  do  find.  The  nation  was  too 
busy  with  the  work  of  creating  Beauty  in  all  the  Arts,  to 
devote  very  much  of  its  time  to  a  reflective  analysis  of  its 
nature.  It  is  usually  so,  in  these  periods,  when  originality 
is  great,  and  the  productive  impulse  strong.  Underneath 
the  creative  spirit,  however,  there  lurked  the  critical ;  and 
the  speculative  habit  was  developed  so  early  in  Greece,  the 
love  of  synthesis  and  of  clear  theoretic  views  was  so  persist- 
ent, that  the  founders  of  all  the  great  schools  of  Philosophy 
could  not  fail  to  speculate  on  the  meaning  of  Beauty,  as 
well  as  on  the  nature  of  Knowledge  and  of  Conduct. 


22  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 


2.   Socrates  and  Plato 

Passing  over  the  anticipations  of  later  thought  to  be 
found  amongst  the  Pythagoreans — who  emphasised  the 
principle  of  order  and  symmetry — we  may  begin  the  history 
of  Greek  opinion  with  Socrates. 

The  theory  of  Beauty  suggested  by  him — so  far  as  it  can 
be  called  a  theory — is  a  very  defective  one.  It  was  not  in 
this  direction  that  the  insight  of  the  great  moralist  lay.  If 
Socrates  did  not  identify  the  Beautiful  with  the  useful,  he 
certainly  made  their  utility  the  test  of  beautiful  things  ;  just 
as  in  his  ethics,  after  his  quarrel  with  the  doctrine  of  Aris- 
tippus,  he  fell  back  upon  a  utilitarian  test  of  the  morality  of 
actions.  This  was,  to  a  certain  extent,  a  sign  of  his 
catholicity.  On  the  other  hand,  with  all  his  intellectual 
eminence — and  perhaps  just  because  of  his  greatness  as  a 
moralist — Socrates  did  not  appreciate  Beauty,  in  and  for 
itself.  It  had  little  glory  to  him,  "  because  of  the  glory  that 
excelled  it "  in  human  conduct.  It  was  the  purpose  which 
beautiful  things  subserved  that  chiefly  interested  him. 

In  his  Memorabilia  (iii.  8)  Xenophon  narrates  a  con- 
versation between  Aristippus  and  Socrates,  in  which  the 
latter  says,  "  Whatsoever  is  beautiful  is  for  the  same  reason 
good,  when  suited  to  the  purpose  for  which  it  was  intended." 
"  Whatsoever,"  he  adds,  "  is  suited  for  the  end  intended, 
with  respect  to  that  end  is  good  and  fair ;  and  contrariwise, 
it  must  be  deemed  evil  and  deformed,  when  it  departs  from 
the  purpose  which  it  was  designed  to  promote."  He  goes 
on  to  apply  this  theory  of  fitness  to  the  beauty  of  such 
things  as  houses.  Those  houses  are  most  beautiful  which 
are  most  convenient. 

This  is  not  a  partial  theory,  it  is  an  altogether  erroneous 
one,  as  will  be  abundantly  seen  in  the  sequel ;  but  it  is 
worthy  of  note  that  Socrates  seems  to  have  realised  that 
the  beauty  of  expression  is  superior  to  any  other  kind  of 
beauty.  In  another  passage  of  the  same  chapter  of  the 
Memorabilia  it  is  recorded  that  he  went  one  day  into  the 
atelier  of  the  sculptor  Clito — he  had  himself  been  a  sculptor 


iv  The  Philosophy  of  Greece  23 

in  his  boyhood — and  remarked  to  him  that  the  best 
sculptor  was  the  man  whose  statues  best  expressed  the 
inner  workings  of  the  mind. 

As  all  the  world  knows,  Socrates'  chief  pupil,  Plato, 
developed  his  master's  philosophy  along  many  lines,  draw- 
ing out  its  latent  significance  and  its  hidden  implicates  ; 
and  it  is  with  his  name,  more  than  with  that  of  any  other 
thinker,  that  future  generations  have  associated  Idealism, 
both  in  Philosophy  and  in  Art.  Consciously  or  uncon- 
sciously, all  idealism  draws  its  inspiration  from  Plato ;  and 
if  his  theory  of  the  Beautiful  was  not  fully  wrought  out 
(which  it  was  not),  this  was  partly  due  to  the  fact  that  he 
lived  in  such  a  constant  atmosphere  of  Beauty,  both  artistic 
and  literary,  that  he  did  not  care  to  analyse  it  speculatively 
in  the  same  way  that  he  analysed  the  nature  of  the  true 
and  the  good.  The  intellectual  and  moral  theories  of  his  day 
were  sectarian  and  full  of  flaws  ;  while  the  pursuit  of  know- 
ledge was  as  fitful  as  the  standard  of  duty  was  capricious. 
He  did  not  find  so  much  amiss  in  the  art  of  the  period.  It 
was  the  age  of  Pericles. 

In  the  Gorgias  it  is  affirmed  that  things  are  beautiful 
"with  reference  to  some  standard"  (474),  but  in  this  dia- 
logue Beauty  is  measured  by  the  standard  of  "  pleasure  and 
utility." 

In  the  Hippias  Major — and  no  question  need  here  be 
raised  as  to  the  genuineness  of  this  dialogue,  or  of  its  place 
in  the  Platonic  canon — Socrates  is  represented  as  discuss- 
ing with  Hippias,  a  peripatetic  sophist  from  Elis,  amongst 
other  things,  the  question  of  the  Beautiful.    Various  theories 
are  started,  and  all  are  rejected  as  inadequate.      Socrates 
asks  Hippias,  What  is  Beauty?    What  is  the  common  quality 
in  which  beautiful  things,  each  very  diverse  one  from  the 
other,  all  agree  ?     ert  Se  KCU  So/ce?  aot  avro  TO  KaXov  u>  KCU 
raAAa  Travra  KO<r//.eiTcu  KCU  /caAa  ^aiverat  (289).      After 
many  turnings  and  windings  of  the  dialogue,  an  answer  to 
the  question  is  found  in  this  :  The  common  element  is  the  I 
becoming,  the  suitable,  or  the  fit,  TO  TT/OCTTOV.      But  immedi- 1 
ately  another  question  arises,  which  shows  that  the  solution  ,' 
just  given  is  inadequate.      Is  Beauty  a  reality,  or  only  an  | 


24  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

appearance?  The  "becoming"  may  be  only  that  which 
makes  things  appear  beautiful.  But  is  Beauty  only 
apparent,  only  seeming  ?  In  answer  to  this  question, 
Socrates  lays  hold  of  the  old  principle  of  the  useful,  TO 
•%pi/j(rLfJLov,  the  serviceable ;  and  he  goes  on  to  ask,  on  what 
does  this  usefulness  or  serviceableness  depend  ?  He 
answers  that  it  depends  upon  the  latent  capacity  of  things, 
their  Swa/Jts  ;  and  so  he  concludes  Swa/us  fjikv  apa  KaAov 
dSwa/jLia  8e  ai<r\pov  (295)  :  latent  power  or  strength  is 
always  beautiful,  and  weakness  always  ugly.  But  he  at  once 
perceives  an  objection  that  may  be  urged,  and  adds  that 
the  power  or  energy  of  a  thing  cannot  be  beautiful  unless  it 
is  'well  directed,  directed  to  an  end  that  is  good  ;  and  so 
the  beautiful  and  the  good  become  inter-related  as  cause 
and  effect. 

Yet  again — perceiving,  doubtless,  the  incompleteness  of 
the  latter  doctrine — Plato  makes  Socrates  fall  back  on  a 
quasi-materialistic  view  of  the  origin  of  Beauty.  TO  KaAov 
€o~Tt  TO  6Y  OLKOTJS  TC  Kol  o^ews  rjSv  (298).  Beauty  lies  in 
the  pleasure  of  sight  and  of  hearing.  In  reference  to  this 
new  definition,  we  have  again  to  find  the  element  that  is 
common  to  sight  and  to  hearing ;  and  also  to  determine 
why  the  pleasures  which  reach  us  through  these  two  senses 
are  superior  to  those  which  reach  us  through  any  others,  so 
that  they  are  raised  to  a  sort  of  intellectual  throne  above 
the  others.  This  Plato  tries  to  determine  in  the  rest  of  the 
dialogue,  in  which  there  is  a  great  deal  of  detached  and 
very  stimulating  thinking  about  Beauty,  although  no  consist- 
ent theory  of  it  is  reached.  The  Hippias  is  pre-eminently 
a  "  dialogue  of  search." 

The  primary  theme  of  the  Symposium  is  love,  but  it  is 
a  love  which  rises  from  the  lower  plane  of  sense  to  the 
apprehension  of  what  is  absolutely  beautiful.  Beyond  in- 
dividual objects,  in  the  vast  intermediate  sea  of  beautiful 
things,  we  reach  that  which  is  intrinsically  beautiful — that 
which  does  not  wax  or  wane,  which  does  not  become 
more  or  less  beautiful,  but  is  absolutely  and  always  the 
same. 

"He  who  would  proceed  aright  in  this  matter  should 


iv  The  Philosophy  of  Greece  25 

begin  to  visit  beautiful  forms  ;  soon  he  will  perceive  that  the 
beauty  of  one  form  is  akin  to  the  beauty  of  another  ;  and 
then,  if  beauty  of  form  in  general  is  his  pursuit,  how  foolish 
would  he  be  not  to  recognise  that  the  beauty  in  every  form 
is  one  and  the  same.  And,  when  he  perceives  this,  he  will 
become  a  lover  of  all  beautiful  forms  ;  and  next  he  will  con- 
sider that  the  beauty  of  the  mind  is  more  honourable  than 
the  beauty  of  things  outward."  (He  will  go  on  to  the  beauty 
of  laws  and  institutions,  and  thence  to  the  beauty  of  the 
sciences,  understanding  that  the  beauty  of  them  all  "  is  of 
one  family.")  "At  length  the  vision  will  be  revealed  to 
him  of  a  single  science,  which  is  the  science  of  Beauty 
everywhere  ...  a  thing  of  wondrous  beauty,  which  is  ever- 
lasting, not  growing  and  decaying,  or  waxing  and  waning 
.  .  .  but  beauty  absolute,  separate,  simple,  and  everlast- 
ing, which,  without  diminution  and  without  increase,  is 
imparted  to  the  ever-growing  and  perishing  beauties  of  all 
other  things."  .  .  .  He  learns  "  to  use  the  beauties  of  earth 
as  steps  along  which  he  mounts  upwards,  going  from  fair 
forms  to  fair  practices,  and  from  fair  practices  to  fair  notions, 
until  from  fair  notions  he  arrives  at  the  notion  of  absolute 
Beauty,  and  at  last  knows  what  the  essence  of  Beauty  is." 
..."  If  man  has  eyes  to  see  the  true  beauty,  he  becomes 
the  friend  of  God  and  immortal"  (Symp.  210-212). 

In  the  Phaedrus  the  same  theme  is  continued  ;  and  the 
Absolute  Beauty  is  recognised  as  a  supersensible  essence, 
discerned  by  the  mind  when  thrown  into  ecstasy  in  its 
presence.  This  intellectual  vision  of  Beauty  so  purifies 
sensation  as  almost  to  transfigure  it ;  while,  from  its  non- 
sensuous  character,  the  intuition  which  we  experience  here 
and  now  is  looked  on  as  the  reminiscence  of  a  former  life. 
We  saw  the  Beautiful  in  an  ante-natal  life.  Here  we  per- 
ceive it,  only  "  through  a  glass  darkly,"  shining  through  the 
apertures  of  sense  ;  and  this  explains  how  its  perception 
fills  the  soul  with  a  kind  of  awe,  and  moves  the  percipient 
to  reverence.  "  Coming  to  earth,  we  find  her  (Beauty) 
shining  in  clearness  through  the  doorways  of  sense.  .  .  . 
This  is  the  privilege  of  Beauty,  that  she  is  the  loveliest, 
and  also  the  most  palpable  to  sight"  (Phaedrus,  250). 


26  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

In  the  Philebus  (51-65,  66),  perhaps,  a  still  higher  note 
is  struck.  The  Beautiful  is  regarded  as  an  evolution  or 
development  out  of  the  non-beautiful,  by  the  harmony  of 
opposites,  an  idea  also  hinted  at  in  the  Lysis  (216).  In 
the  Republic  there  are  stray  suggestions  and  reflections 
on  the  Beautiful,  but  no  complete  discussion  of  it.  The 
idea  of  proportion,  or  harmony,  seems  the  radical  idea  con- 
nected with  it,  both  in  this  and  in  all  the  other  Platonic 
analysis  of.  the  subject.  In  the  5th  Book  of  the  Republic 
we  are  told  that  few  are  able  to  attain  to  the  vision  of  the 
Absolute  Beauty ;  that  he  who  has  never  seen  it — though 
he  may  be  familiar  enough  with  beautiful  things — is  like 
one  in  a  dream,  and  not  awake  ;  but  that  he  who  can  dis- 
tinguish absolute  Beauty  from  the  individual  objects  that 
partake  of  it,  or  participate  in  it,  is  relatively  wide-awake. 
He  has  attained  to  knowledge  (orttmtfttf),  while  others 
have  only  reached  opinion  (Sofa)  (476).  And  what  is  it  that 
he  knows  ?  It  is  this  :  that  all  visible  things  are  types,  in 
which  are  mirrored  to  us  the  features  of  certain  archetypes, 
and  are  therefore  the  mere  shadows  of  higher  realities. 
The  aesthetic  education  of  man  consists  in  his  learning  thus 
to  rise  from  the  type  to  its  archetype. 

These  are  fragments  of  Plato's  teaching  on  the  subject  of 
the  Beautiful.  It  is  somewhat  curious,  however,  that  one 
with  whose  name  idealism  in  Art  is  so  indissolubly  associated 
should  not  have  given  us  a  fully  elaborated  theory  of  it  in 
any  of  his  writings  ;  that  he  should  not  have  written  a  special 
dialogue,  of  which  TO  /caAov  was  the  distinctive  theme  ; 
and  that,  in  consequence,  his  teaching  on  the  subject  re- 
quires to  be  gathered  out  of  several  of  the  dialogues,  in  some 
of  which  it  occurs  almost  incidentally.  The  essential  part 
of  his  teaching  may  perhaps  be  stated  thus  :  In  every 
beautiful  object  two  things  are  conjoined  —  the  sensible 
phenomenon  (the  form),  and  the  idea  which  it  embodies, 
and  which  underlies  the  form.  The  one  is  individual,  and 
concrete  ;  the  other  general,  and  abstract.  The  former  is 
visible,  and  transient ;  the  latter  invisible,  and  permanent. 
The  chief  use  of  the  lower  is  to  lead  on,  and  to  lead  up  to 
the  higher ;  as  the  supreme  function  of  Philosophy  is  to 


iv  TJie  Philosophy  of  Greece  27 

conduct  us  from  phenomenal  types  to  noumenal  archetypes,  / 
and  in  this  particular  case  to  the  one,  universal,  and  abso- 
lute archetype,  viz.  to  that  Beauty  which  cannot  appear  or 
disappear,  but  which  always  is,  always  was,  and  always 
will  be,  at  the  very  core  of  things,  and  at  the  centre  of  the 
universe. 

Plato's  banishment  of  the  poets  from  his  ideal  Republic 
is  easily  explained.  Nothing  else  was  possible.  He  made 
the  chasm  between  the  ideal  and  the  real  so  wide,  that 
he  could  not  admit  any  actual  products,  such  as  Poetry  and 
Art,  into  the  former  realm.  In  the  other  sphere,  that  of  the 
actual,  every  great  system  and  every  great  religion  creates 
its  own  poetry  and  its  own  art.  The  Greek  civilisation 
did  this,  so  did  Christianity.1 

There  were  several  Greek  artists  who  wrote  on  their 
art  (or  left  dicta  upon  it),  and  other  art -critics — whose 
works  have  perished,  and  the  date  of  whose  lives  is  to  a 
certain  extent  obscure — whose  names  may  be  remembered 
as  links  in  the  chain  of  Hellenic  opinion  and  art,  as  they 
were  probably  Plato's  contemporaries.  Of  these,  Parrhasius 
— referred  to  by  Pliny  as  great  in  expression  as  well  as  in 
symmetry,  and  also  mentioned  by  Quintilian  and  Xenophon 
— and  Pamphilus,  who  wrote  several  works  on  Art,  were 
the  most  important. 

3.  Aristotle 

When  we  pass  from  Plato  to  Aristotle  we  find  that — on 
this  subject,  no  less  than  on  others — the  tide  of  philosophic 
thought  had  turned.  A  reaction  from  the  teachings  of 
idealism  toward  matter-of-fact  experience  was  inevitable. 
Instead  of  a  metaphysical  intuition  of  first  principles  by  a 
direct  speculative  glance,  a  priori,  we  have  now  a  psycho- 
logical analysis  of  concrete  parts,  a  posteriori.  It  is  some- 
what remarkable  that  Aristotle  wrote  no  treatise  on  the 
Beautiful,  as  he  wrote  separate  books  on  Logic,  Metaphysics, 
Psychology,  Ethics,  Politics,  Rhetoric,  and  the  art  of  Poetry, 

1  An  able  analysis  of  the  teaching  of  Plato  on  the  beautiful  will  be 
found  in  Arnold  Ruge's  Die  Platonische  Aesthetik  (1832). 


28  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

as  well  as  on  many  of  the  sciences.  He  refers  to  the  subject 
in  many  of  his  works,  in  the  Poetics,  the  Rhetoric,  the  Meta- 
physics, and  the  Politics.  He  knew  nothing  of  an  absolute 
Beauty,  above  and  beyond  the  relative  things  that  shadow 
it  forth.  His  philosophy  did  not  seek  to  unite  the  phenomena 
of  Sense,  bringing  them  within  the  category  of  a  single  prin- 
ciple, but  rather  to  divide  them  further  and  further,  and 
after  analysis  to  arrange  them  as  independent  provinces  or 
subsections  in  the  map  of  knowledge.  Accordingly,  he  did 
not  identify  the  Beautiful  with  the  Good,  as  Plato  had  done. 
On  the  contrary,  he  carefully  distinguished  the  one  from  the 
other.  His  whole  philosophy  was  analytic,  rather  than 
synthetic  ;  or,  as  it  may  perhaps  be  better  put,  any 
synthesis  he  ever  reached  was  the  late  result  of  a  lifelong 
analysis.  He  saw  that  the  provinces  of  the  Beautiful  and 
the  Good,  to  a  certain  extent,  overlapped  each  other ; 
but,  while  the  Good  could  only  be  realised  in  action  or 
achievement — which  was  a  state  of  motion — the  Beautiful 
could  exist  in  a  state  of  repose,  in  still  life,  or  a  state  of 
actual  rest. 

Aristotle  distinguished  the  Beautiful  from  the  fit  and  the 
useful  ;  and  he  drew  a  fruitful  distinction  between  an  admira- 
tion for  beautiful  things,  and  those  desires  arising  from  the 
senses,  which  crave  possession  of  objects.  There  is  no 
necessary  desire  for  possession,  in  contemplating  a  beauti- 
ful object.  The  emotion  is  disinterested.  This  distinc- 
tion is  a  most  important  one,  and  it  reappears  in  many 
forms  within  the  school  which  he  founded,  and  has  quite 
recently  been  emphasised  in  the  empirical  psychology  of 
England. 

Aristotle's  analysis  of  the  ultimate  elements  of  Beauty 
seems,  however,  to  conduct  us  in  the  end  to  a  doctrine 
x  not  very  far  removed  from  that  of  Plato.  So  far  as  he 
reaches  a  principle  at  all,  it  is  that  of  order  and  symmetry, 
ra£is,  and'  the  phenomena  of  the  beautiful  certainly  yield 
a  very  significant  illustration  of  his  great  principle  of  the 
jjLeo-orrjs — the  mean  between  extremes — and  one  much 
more  remarkable  than  Aristotle  was  himself  aware  of. 
His  discussion  of  the  essential  nature  of  Beauty  is  ex- 


iv  The  Philosophy  of  Greece  29 

tremely  slight,  although  throughout  his  works  there  is 
much  interesting  discussion  on  Art,  and  its  subsections 
and  correlations.  Aristotle  had  a  distinct  perception  of 
the  sphere  of  a  science  of  aesthetics,  a  clearer  one  perhaps 
than  Plato  had,  although  he  did  not  recognise  a  philosophy 
of  the  Beautiful. 


CHAPTER    V 

THE   NEOPLATONISTS 
I.  Plotinus 

IN  the  Neoplatonic  school — which  arose  at  Alexandria  in 
the  beginning  of  the  third  century  A.D.,  and  passed  thence 
to  Rome  and  to  Athens — the  philosophy  of  Plato  was 
allied  with  other,  and  mainly  with  Eastern  elements.  There 
was  a  decline  in  scientific  rigour,  and  a  reaction  from 
Aristotle's  severe  analysis  of  fact ;  while  ecstasy,  rather  than 
reason,  came  to  be  regarded  as  the  organ  of  apprehension, 
by  which  we  know  the  reality  of  things.  Plato  had 
developed  his  idealism,  chiefly  within  the  intellectual  and 
moral  sphere  ;  and  his  aesthetics  were,  at  their  bes.t,  only  a 
subordinate  chapter  of  his  ethics.  The  problem  of  the 
Beautiful  was  wrought  out,  however,  more  symmetrically, 
if  not  more  satisfactorily,  amongst  the  Neoplatonists,  and 
amongst  them  most  notably  by  Plotinus  (205-270  A.D.). 
The  root  of  his  system  was  that  we  do  not  get  to  know  the 
essential  truth  of  things  by  reason,  but  by  a  higher  kind  of 
vision,  or  by  intellectual  and  moral  intuition.  Through  this 
intuition  the  Infinite  realises  itself  within  us,  and  all  separa- 
tion between  us  and  the  Absolute  is  overcome  in  a  process 
of  mystic  illumination. 

Plotinus's  theory  starts  from  the  recognition  of  an 
absolute  reason  (vovs)  within  the  universe,  in  itself  perfect, 
but  which,  whenever  it  begins  to  realise  itself  in  matter, 
meets  with  hindrance.  Hence  it  cannot  be  mirrored  to  us, 
as  it  is  in  itself.  It  is  the  barrier  of  the  material  that 


CHAP,  v  The  Neoplatonists  31 

presents  an  obstacle  to  this  perfect  reflection  of  the  essence 
of  things.  But  the  mind  of  man  is  able  to  rise  above 
matter,  and  to  grasp  the  ideas  that  flow  into  it  directly,  as 
they  proceed  from  a  supra-material  source.  It  is  thus  that 
we  rise  from  the  actual  to  the  ideal.  We  do  not  reach  the 
ideal  by  a  process  of  generalisation  from  the  actual.  We 
obtain  a  vision  of  it  direct  from  its  own  source.  Beauty 
does  not  lie  in  material  substance,  but  in  those  eternal  ideas 
which  material  forms  very  inadequately  reflect.  It  is  to  be 
seen,  not  with  the  outward,  but  with  the  "  inward  eye."  In 
the  material  world  there  are  countless  dim  mirrors  of  the 
absolute  Beauty,  which  is  only  very  partially  disclosed  (as 
the  immanent  underlying  essence  of  things),  in  their  pheno- 
menal forms.  But  the  ideas,  thus  mirrored,  pass  from  the 
objects,  in  which  they  transiently  appear,  into  the  mind  of 
man  ;  and,  as  soon  as  they  arrive,  they  rouse  other  ideas 
from  their  latency,  and  move  the  soul  to  admiration.  The 
following  is  the  most  explicit  passage  in  the  Enneades  bearing 
on  the  subject  : — "  That  which  sees  must  be  kindred  and  ( 
similar  to  its  object,  before  it  can  see  it.  The  eye  could  never ' 
have  beheld  the  sun,  had  it  not  become  sunlike.  The  mind 
could  never  have  perceived  the  beautiful,  had  it  not  first/ 
become  beautiful  itself.  Every  one  must  partake  of  the 
divine  nature,  before  he  can  discern  the  divinely  beautiful " 
(Enneades,  i.  6,  9).1 

Beauty  is  thus  the  eternal  Aoyos,  the  word  or  reason/ 
of  the  Universe,  dimly  shadowed  forth  by  symbols  in  matter. 
Objects  are  ugly  when  they  are  devoid  of  this  Aoyos. 
They  are  beautiful  when  they  are  filled  with  it ;  and  the 
soul  of  the  artist,  if  susceptible  to  Beauty,  drinks  it  in,  and 
becomes  filled  with  the  Aoyos  of  the  Universe.  The  result 
is  that  his  creations  may  be  finer,  richer,  and  more  beautiful 
than  the  beauty  of  Nature  itself  is.  But  all  of  us  (whether 
artists  or  not),  lookmg  around  on  Nature,  can  easily  see 

1  rb  yap  bp&v  Trpbs  rb  bpufj-evov  avyyevts  KO!  6/j.otov  troi^ffa^vov  dec 
e7rij3c£XXaz>  ry  dta.     ov  yap  av  iruiroTe  elSei/  6(j>da\/J.bs  ijXiov 
ytcrj    yeyevTjfj.tj'os,    ov5£  rb  KaXbv    ai>    tdoi    ^vxh    /*??    Ka\i] 
yevtvdu  5ri  irpwrov  deoeidrjs  Tras,  Kal  /caXds  Tras  et  /ueAXa 
debv  re  Kal  Ka\6v. 


32  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

that  the  actual  and  the  ideal  do  not  harmonise.  The  ideal 
transcends  the  actual ;  and  as  soon  as  the  individual  mind 
has  a  glimpse  of  the  former,  the  latter  no  longer  satisfies  it, 
but  a  pursuit  begins,  which  can  only  be  satisfied  by  some 
sort  of  identification  with  the  ideal.  Each  individual  object 
in  the  realm  of  the  actual,  however  beautiful  it  may  be — 
and  even  although  an  artificial  halo  of  the  beautiful  may 
gather  round  it — is  of  use  only  as  yielding  a  point  of 
departure  towards  the  absolutely  and  infinitely  beautiful. 

But  now,  in  what  does  the  beauty  of  single  objects, 
individual  and  external,  consist  ?  In  his  flight  to  the 
transcendent,  Plotinus  does  not  ignore  this  question.  He 
t explicitly  raises,  and  at  least  tries  to  answer  it.  Does  it 
'consist,  as  Aristotle  thought,  in  symmetry?  The  Neo- 
platonist  answers  "  No."  And  why  ?  First,  because 
objects  individually  beautiful  are  not  all  "  made  up  "  of  parts, 
symmetrically  adjusted  and  correlated.  They  are  wholes, 
in  which  the  parts  are  taken  up,  and  lost  to  view.  And 
secondly,  because  parts  that  are  symmetrically  adjusted 
may  be  individually  ugly.  No.  It  is  only  when  the  external 
, mirrors  the  internal,  when  matter  is  radiant  with  mind, 
:when  intelligence  permeates  the  unintelligent,  when  the 
ideal  (different  from  and  detached  from  the  actual)  is  super- 
imposed upon  it,  and  pervades  it  for  the  time  being,  that 
any  individual  thing  becomes  beautiful.  Nature  is  thus  a  con- 

itinuous  mirror  of  what  transcends  itself,  and  it  is  only  when  it 
reflects  the  transcendent  that  any  single  object  has  beauty. 
The  merit  of  the  Neoplatonic  philosophy  is  the  merit 
of  idealism  in  general.  It  is  not  the  particular  doctrine 
which  it  taught,  but  its  taking  us  away — alike  in  the 
intellectual,  moral,  and  aesthetic  sphere — from  manifoldness, 
from  scattered  "  opinions,"  miscellaneous  "  principles," 
detached  "  points  of  view,"  bundles  of  "  ideas,"  suggestive 
"  notions,"  et  hoc  genus  omne,  to  that  unity  where  no 
division  is,  and  therefore  to  the  rock  that  is  higher  than 
we.  In  contrast  with  this,  the  experience  philosophy — 
whether  in  knowledge,  morals,  or  taste — gives  us  multiplicity 
without  unity,  the  heterogeneous  without  the  homogeneous, 
the  associated  without  the  associating  bond.  Idealism  is 


v  The  Neoplatonists  33 

always  needed  as  a  counter-weight  in  the  scale  over  and 
against  this  doctrine  of  conglomerates,  which  denies  an 
underlying  unity.  So  far  good,  and  so  far  we  are  indebted 
to  Plotinus  and  to  Plato  ;  but  that  is  not  enough.  We 
must  also  find  some  link  of  connection  between  the  two 
realms,  between  the  one  and  the  many,  the  ideal  and  the 
actual ;  and  to  be  adequate,  the  link  must  be  an  organic 
one.  It  is  unfortunately  the  case  that  the  theory  of  Plotinus 
does  not  bridge  the  chasm  any  more  satisfactorily  than 
Plato's  did,  six  centuries  earlier.1 


2.  Proclus 

A  contemporary  of  Plotinus  wrote  a  work,  TTC/H  vif/ovs,  on 
the  Sublime.  This  work,  ascribed  to  Longinus  (213-273), 
is  well  known,  and  has  often  been  edited  and  annotated. 
It  contains  no  real  light,  however,  on  the  philosophy  of  the 
subject.  On  the  whole,  it  may  be  said  to  revert  from  the 
Neoplatonic  teaching  to  the  doctrine  of  the  founder  of  the 
Academy.  Homer  and  Plato  are  the  writers  whom  Longinus 
chiefly  quotes.  In  describing  the  Sublime  as  that  which 
"  strikes  home"  (sec.  i)  and  that  which  "  sinks  deep,"  which 
"  transports  one's  soul,  and  exalts  one's  thoughts  "  (sec.  7), 
as  that  which  "pervades,  and  throws  an  audience  into 
transport,"  we  manifestly  do  not  get  far  beyond  the  com- 
monplace, despite  the  praise  of  the  critics. 

Proclus  (412-485)  wrote,  amongst  other  works,  a 
treatise  on  the  theology  of  Plato  ;  the  twenty-fourth  chapter 
of  the  ist  Book  of  which  is  "concerning  divine  Beauty, 
and  the  elements  of  it,  as  taught  by  Plato."  He  recognised 
a  primary  suprasensible  Beauty  which  is  the  cause  of  all 
the  secondary  or  derivative  beauty  of  the  world,  whether 
seen  in  mind  or  matter.  It  is  the  bond  of  union  in  the 
suprasensible  realm.  A  certain  delicacy  or  ethereality 
characterises  it ;  also  a  splendour  and  loveliness  which 
make  it  the  object  of  love.  It  is  this  sovran  beauty  that 

1  An  "  examen  critique  "  of  the  doctrine  of  Plotinus  will  be  found 
in  J.  Barthelemy  Saint-Hilaire's  L '  £cole  d'Alexandrie  (1845). 

D 


34  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful       CHAP,  v 

moves  and  attracts  the  things  of  sense,  that  causes  them 
to  energise.  The  infinite  Beauty  moving  through  the 
world  is  the  source  of  finite  splendour,  and  by  love  men 
are  drawn  toward  it,  and  participate  in  it.  Proclus  saw 
clearly  the  fallacy  of  the  imitative  theory  of  Art.  "  He  who 
takes  for  his  model  the  forms  which  Nature  produces,  and 
keeps  to  a  literal  imitation  of  these,  can  never  reach  what 
is  perfectly  beautiful.  Nature  is  full  of  disproportion,  and 
falls  short  of  the  true  standard  of  Beauty." 


CHAPTER   VI 

THE    GR^ECO-ROMAN    PERIOD 

I.  Introductory 

WE  have  no  discussion  of  the  philosophy  of  Beauty  in 
Latin  literature.  In  almost  all  the  classic  writers  there 
are  allusions  to  the  subject,  in  Cicero  especially  ;  and  the 
poets  Lucretius  and  Virgil  glance  at  it ;  but  "  let  others 
study  Art,"  said  Virgil  in  the  ^Eneid,  "  Rome  has  somewhat 
better  in  hand,  viz.  Law  and  Dominion."  The  love  of 
Beauty,  and  its  passionate  pursuit,  had  done  its  work  in 
Greece.  It  passed  away,  giving  place  to  a  different  ideal  ; 
and,  while  the  Roman  world  could  not  ignore  the  beauti- 
ful, it  contented  itself,  for  the  most  part,  by  utilising  it.  The 
aim  of  Greek  Art  was  to  reach  the  ideal  and  express  it, 
the  artist  being  forgotten  in  his  work.  In  Roman  Art,  the 
aim  was  a  kind  of  splendour  or  magnificence  that  reflected 
back  both  on  the  artist  and  his  patron.  Rome  enriched 
herself  by  bringing  Beauty  into  her  service,  and  made  it 
tributary,  without  loving  it  supremely ;  and  when  Greece 
became  a  dependency  of  Rome — as  part  of  Italy  had 
once  been  Magna  Grsecia — the  Art  then  in  the  ascend- 
ant was  more  imitative  than  original.  Sculpture  still 
flourished,  and  far  exceeded  in  amount  the  early  splendour 
of  the  Periclean  age  ;  but  while  we  have  the  Venus  de 
Medici  and  the  Apollo  Belvidere  as  its  outcome,  the  ideal 
grace  of  the  Phidian  art  had  vanished.  Every  great  Roman 
had  statues  innumerable  in  his  villa,  but  it  was  the  age  of 
the  dilettante  and  the  connoisseur.  Collectors  laid  their 


36  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

effeminate  hands  on  Art,  and  almost  killed  it.  So  far  as 
there  was  any  attempt  at  originality,  it  was  as  a  chronicle 
of  the  greatness  of  the  Latin  race  that  Art  was  made  use  of. 
It  was  a  record,  not  an  inspiration. 

Every  ancient  writer  on  Art  refers  to  Euphranor  ( 

362  B.C.)  as  a  master.  The  date  of  his  birth  is  uncertain, 
but,  as  the  subject  of  one  of  his  paintings  was  the  battle  of 
Mantinea,  he  cannot  have  died  before  363.  He  was  both 
painter  and  sculptor,  and  he  wrote  a  work,  so  Pliny  tells 
us,  De  Symmetria  et  Coloribus ;  and  from  Pliny  down  to 
Hirt  (Geschichte  d.  Bild  Kunst.^  the  symmetrical  excellence 
of  his  own  work  has  been  noted.  Philostratus  praises  him 
much  as  an  artist ;  so  does  Pliny.  His  value  to  the  student 
of  the  progress  of  philosophical  thought  lies  in  the  fact  that 
he  developed,  both  in  his  teaching  and  practice,  those 
principles  of  Art  which  Greek  Philosophy  had  inculcated  in 
its  prime. 

A  century  and  a  half  later,  during  the  time  of  the  Second 
Punic  War,  Plautus,  the  chief  writer  of  Roman  comedy, 

'  flourished.  The  only  reason  for  referring  to  him  is,  that 
the  teachings  of  idealism  come  out  in  his  assertion  that  the 

|  poet  seeks  for  that  which  does  not  as  yet  exist  anywhere, 
and  finds  it.  How  then  does  he  come  by  it  ?  He  obtains 

1  it  from  within,  from  his  own  mind.  Thus,  too,  it  is  that  the 
idealist  is  the  best  historian,  because  he  is  the  best  inter- 
preter of  what  exists.  He  combines  (e.g.  in  a  drama  or  in 
a  novel)  what  no  individual  life  presents,  but  what  is  truer 
to  Nature,  and  a  far  better  mirror  of  his  age,  than  the 
prosaic  chronicle  of  the  lives  of  the  majority  of  the  men  and 
women  that  exist  would  be. 

2.  Lucretius •,  Virgil ',  Cicero ',  etc. 

Another  century,  and  we  reach  two  Roman  writers 
whose  works  cast  some  light  both  on  the  opinions  of  the 
educated  few,  and  on  the  attitude  of  the  national  mind 
toward  Nature  and  the  Beautiful,  viz.  Lucretius  and  Virgil. 

Perhaps  no  poet  of  the  ancient  world  combined,  so  well 
as  Lucretius  did,  the  intellectual  survey  of  Nature  with  an 


vi  The  Greece- Roman  Period  37 

imaginative  study  of  it  as  the  mysterious  abode  of  an  in- 
scrutable power.  He  was  the  philosophical  poet  of  antiquity 
par  excellence.  He  did  not  deal  primarily  or  directly,  how- 
ever, with  the  Beautiful  in  Nature.  His  great  work,  De 
Rerum  Natura^  is  a  scientific  poem  on  the  origin  of  things, 
and  their  characteristics  in  the  ever-evolving  life  of  the 
cosmos.  A  somewhat  diluted  Neoplatonism  was  the  intel- 
lectual atmosphere  of  his  age  ;  but  Lucretius  was  far  more 
scientific  than  Plotinus  or  Proclus.  He  invariably  kept 
much  nearer  to  reality ;  and,  by  a  half-speculative  half- 
imaginative  flight,  he  rose  to  a  more  uniformly  consistent 
idea  of  law  and  order  than  any  other  of  the  ancients,  while 
an  aesthetic  view  of  the  universe  was  contained  within  the 
scientific  one.  The  atomic  theory,  and  the  doctrines  of  the 
constancy  of  the  sum  of  existence,  and  the  indestructibility 
of  force,  carried  with  them  the  idea  of  harmony  or  cosmic 
order,  and  implied  a  doctrine  of  the  sublime.  His  genuine 
appreciation  of  Nature,  his  sympathy  with  it  in  all  its 
changing  moods — "  the  reign  of  law "  being  everywhere 
recognised — is  noteworthy ;  but  Lucretius  saw  both  beauty 
and  sublimity  behind  the  laws  of  Nature,  as  in  later  years 
Oersted  saw  them.  Far  more  than  Virgil  did,  he  rejoiced  in 
Nature  for  its  own  sake  ;  and,  while  the  desire  "  rerum 
cognoscere  causas  "  was  dominant,  there  is  also  throughout 
his  great  poem  the  feeling  for  Nature,  and  an  occasional 
sense  of  its  charm,  that  seem  almost  to  anticipate  the  deeper 
appreciation  of  the  nineteenth  century. 

The  Latin  race,  however,  theorised  less  than  the  Greeks 
had  done  on  the  phenomena  that  called  forth  their  admira- 
tion or  delight.  Relatively  speaking,  there  is  no  theory  of 
Beauty  at  all  to  be  found  in  Roman  literature ;  but  it  does 
not  follow  that  the  finer  spirits  of  the  nation  appreciated  it 
the  less  on  that  account.  There  is  ample  evidence,  even  in 
Catullus,  and  much  more  in  Virgil  and  Homer,  of  these 
poets'  joy  in  Nature,  in  her  various  phases  and  her  changing 
moods,  throughout  the  day  and  year,  from  sunrise  to  sunset, 
and  from  spring  to  winter ;  and  not  only  of  a  delight  in 
Nature  in  general,  but  of  the  charm  of  landscape.  As  the 
late  Professor  Sellar  put  it,  "The  love  of  natural  scenery 


38  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

and  of  country  life  is  certainly  more  prominently  expressed 
in  Roman  than  in  Greek  poetry.  .  .  .  The  conscious  en- 
joyment of  Nature  as  a  prominent  motive  of  poetry  first 
appears  in  the  Alexandrian  era.  The  great  poets  of  earlier 
times  were  too  deeply  penetrated  by  the  thought  of  the 
mystery  and  the  grandeur  in  human  life  to  dwell  much  on 
the  spectacle  of  the  outward  world.  Though  their  delicate 
sense  of  beauty  was  unconsciously  cherished  and  refined  by 
the  air  which  they  breathed,  and  the  scenes  by  which  they 
were  surrounded ;  yet  they  do  not,  like  the  Roman  poets, 
yield  to  the  passive  pleasures  derived  from  contemplating 
the  aspect  of  the  natural  world  "  ( The  Roman  Poets  of  the 
Republic,  pp.  17,  18,  ed.  1881). 

Throughout  the  Georgics — at  once  a  book  of  Nature,  and 
a  book  of  the  Farm — this  delight  in  the  ever-renovating 
life  of  the  world  comes  out.  But  in  Virgil,  perhaps,  the 
most  noteworthy  passage  bearing  on  the  subject  is  that 
stately  one  in  the  speech  of  Anchises  towards  the  close  of 
the  6th  sEneid,  in  which,  after  yielding  the  supremacy  to 
other  nations  in  Art,  he  claims  for  Rome  the  government  of 
the  world  (11.  847-853).  It  is  thus  that  Mr.  Sellar  traces 
the  difference  between  Virgil  and  Lucretius :  "  The  secret  of 
the  power  of  Lucretius  lies  in  his  recognition  of  the  sub- 
limity of  natural  law  in  ordinary  phenomena.  The  secret 
of  Virgil's  power  lies  in  the  insight,  and  long-practised 
meditation,  through  which  he  abstracts  the  single  element 
of  beauty  from  common  sights,  and  the  ordinary  operations 
of  industry"  (The  Roman  Poets  of  the  Augustan  Age, 
p.  2  3 1 ,  ed.  1 8  7  7  ).  Again,  in  The  Roman  Poets  of  the  Republic 
(pp.  1 8,  19)  he  writes:  "Lucretius,  while  contemplating 
the  majesty  of  Nature's  laws,  and  the  immensity  of  her 
range,  is  at  the  same  time  powerfully  moved  to  sympathy 
with  her  ever-varying  life.  He  feels  the  charm  of  simply 
living  in  fine  weather,  and  looking  on  the  common  aspects 
of  the  world — such  as  the  seashore,  fresh  pastures,  and 
full -flowing  rivers,  or  the  new  loveliness  of  the  early 
morning." 

In  Horace's  enjoyment  of  his  Sabine  farm  and  the 
Bandusian  fount,  etc.,  and  in  Catullus's  delight  in  the 


vi  The  Gr (ECO- Roman  Period  39 

"  Venusta  Sirmio,"  we  have  a  genuine  appreciation  of  the 
charm  of  Nature  ;  but,  in  addition  to  this,  Horace  has  a 
special  claim  on  the  student  of  the  development  of  ideas, 
as  he  was  perhaps  the  first  to  arrange  the  several  Arts  in 
anything  like  order.  We  have  no  such  arrangement  of  them 
in  Greek  literature,  as  in  the  Ars  Poetica.  Aristotle  in  his 
Poetics  refers  to  painting,  music,  and  the  drama,  as  well  as 
to  poetry  (it  is  curious  that  sculpture  and  architecture  were 
omitted,  when  their  triumphs  were  so  obvious  around  him)  ; 
but  it  was  Horace  who  first  drew  out  the  parallel  or  com- 
parison between  poetry  and  painting. 

Cicero's  allusions  to  the  subject  of  Pulchritudo  must 
not  be  forgotten,  and  in  Cicero  we  get  a  somewhat  distant 
approach  to  an  analytic  treatment  of  the  subject.  In  the 
De  Offidis  (i.  §  36)  he  tells  us  that  "  Beauty  is  of  two  kinds, 
one  of  which  consists  in  loveliness,  the  other  in  dignity." 
In  the  4th  Tusculan  disputation  (31)  he  defines  a  par- 
ticular type  of  Beauty  as  "  the  apt  configuration  of  body, 
with  a  certain  delicacy  (suavitas)  of  colour  superadded "  ; 
and  when  discussing,  in  the  De  Oratore,  the  characteristics 
of  the  perfect  orator,  he  illustrates  his  thesis  by  an  example 
drawn  from  the  sculptures  of  Phidias.  He  says  :  "  My  con- 
viction is  that  there  is  nothing  in  the  world  so  beautiful 
that  it  cannot  become  more  beautiful ;  whence  it  follows 
that  what  cannot  be  disclosed  by  the  eye,  or  the  ear,  or  any 
of  the  senses,  can  be  understood  by  the  mind,  or  expressed 
by  the  countenance.  So  too  with  respect  to  the  statues  of 
Phidias,  which  are  the  most  perfect  specimens  of  the  art 
of  sculpture  that  we  possess,  and  the  other  paintings  I  have 
mentioned,  we  can  conceive  things  still  more  beautiful. 
Phidias  himself,  when  he  was  at  work  upon  his  Jupiter  or 
Minerva,  had  no  model  before  him  from  which  he  con- 
structed a  likeness  ;  but  he  had  in  his  mind  an  ideal  of 
beauty,  the  constant  vision  of  which  guided  his  hands  in 
their  executive  work.  As,  therefore,  in  every  form  and 
figure  there  is  something  perfect  which  is  not  beheld  by 
the  sense  of  sight,  so  it  is  by  the  mind  that  we  perceive 
the  ideal  of  oratory ;  it  is  only  its  image  that  we  hear  with 
our  ears." 


40  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 


3.  Vitruvius  to  Philostratus 

In  the  reign  of  Augustus  a  Roman  writer  on  the  theory 
of  Art  became,  and  for  many  generations  continued  to  be, 
the  chief  authority  in  Italy  and  elsewhere  on  the  subject  of 
Architecture.  Vitruvius  (M.  Vitruvius  Pollio),  contemporary 
of  Diodorus  Siculus,  composed  his  treatise,  De  Architecture 
some  time  between  the  years  20  and  1 1  B.C.  He  was  him- 
self an  architect,  but  the  only  building  known  to  have  been 
designed  by  him  is  the  basilica  at  Fanum.  His  treatise  deals 
with  military  as  well  as  with  civil  architecture,  and  is  technical 
rather  than  speculative  ;  but  its  design  was  to  furnish  his 
patron  Augustus  with  certain  principles  by  which  he  might 
judge  of  existing  buildings,  and  determine  the  plans  of  new 
ones.  He  discusses  the  education  of  an  architect,  the 
materials  for  building,  the  orders  of  architecture,  and  the 
decoration  of  houses.  The  first  of  his  ten  Books  is  the 
most  interesting  to  the  student  of  the  theory  and  history  of 
Art.  In  the  first  chapter,  Architecture  is  discussed  in  two 
ways,  "  ex  fabrica,  et  ratiocinatione,"  but  the  two  are  not 
kept  distinct.  Vitruvius's  style  is  extremely  terse  and  ob- 
scure. In  the  second  chapter  he  says  :  "  Architectura  autem 
constat  ex  ordinatione,  quae  Graece  ra£is  dicitur,  et  ex 
dispositione,  hanc  autem  Graeci  Sia#eo-iv  vocant,  eurythmia, 
et  symmetria,  et  decore,  et  distributione,  quae  Graece  OIKO- 
vofjiia  dicitur."  Thus  his  five  principles  of  composition,  or 
rules  of  art,  are — (i)  utility,  ra£is  ;  (2)  proportion,  harmony, 
and  symmetry ;  (3)  disposition,  or  the  arrangement  and 
construction  of  forms,  Sta^eo-ts ;  (4)  the  distribution  of 
forms  in  a  distinctive  style,  oiKovopia ;  (5)  Decor. 

It  is  in  the  discussion  of  "  proportion,"  under  his  second 
head,  that  Vitruvius  is  theoretically  most  explicit.  Sym- 
metry results  from  proportion,  and  proportion  is  the  har- 
mony of  the  parts  of  a  thing  with  the  whole  of  it.  He 
deals  first  with  the  proportion  of  a  single  whole  within  a 
larger  unity,  and  next  with  the  proportion  of  a  whole  com- 
posed of  several  minor  unities.  The  laws  of  symmetry 
were  deduced,  he  thinks,  by  the  great  artists  of  antiquity 


vi  The  Grceco- Roman  Period  41 

from  the  human  body,  and  then  applied  to  architecture  ; 
and  he  traces  an  analogy  between  the  relations  of  the  parts 
to  the  whole  in  the  human  body,  and  in  all  well-constructed 
buildings.  The  abiding  interest  of  the  book  is  that  it  is 
a  treatise  on  Architecture,  based  on  the  principle  of 
proportion. 

There  is  almost  nothing  in  the  writings  of  the  Roman 
Stoics  on  the  subject  of  Art,  although  in  his  58th  epistle, 
§§  15-18,  Seneca  draws  a  distinction  between  iSea  and 
etSos,  which  should  be  noted  in  passing.  The  original,  in 
the  mind  of  the  painter  or  sculptor,  is  the  t'Sea  ;  the  copy, 
transcript,  or  likeness  of  which  is  the  efSos. 

In  the  nth  Book  of  Quintilian  (42-118  A.D.),  on  "Ex- 
pression," we  have  an  account  of  the  progress  of  Greek  Art 
from  Polygnotus  to  Apelles,  and  from  Phidias  to  Lysippus. 
It  is  an  excellent  specimen  of  historical  statement,  clear 
and  terse,  with  no  word  wasted  ;  but  Quintilian  does  not 
discuss  the  theory  of  the  Beautiful. 

In  the  35th  Book  of  the  Historia  Naturalis  of  the 
elder  Pliny  we  have  some  interesting  details  about  ancient 
paintings  and  Art ;  but,  while  there  is  a  mass  of  informa- 
tion as  to  details,  there  is  no  discussion  of  principle  in  Art. 
Pliny  is  an  unreliable  authority,  and  is  only  to  be  trusted 
when  he  is  giving  a  quotation,  if  even  then  ! 

In  the  first  chapter  of  the  3d  Book  of  Arrian's  Discourses 
of  his  master  Epictetus  ('ETrt/crryTov  Atar/3t/?ai),  written 
probably  in  the  latter  half  of  the  second  century  A.D.,  a 
thing  is  described  as  beautiful  when  it  is  "  most  excellent 
according  to  its  proper  nature."  "  As  the  nature  of  each 
is  different,  each  seems  beautiful  in  a  different  way."  But 
if  what  makes  each  thing  beautiful  is  its  possession  of  the 
excellence  peculiar  to  it,  it  surely  follows  that  what  makes 
one  creature  beautiful  may  make  another  ugly. 

A  little  after  the  middle  of  the  second  century,  Galen,  the 
great  physician  and  one  of  the  most  voluminous  authors  of 
antiquity, wrote  his  book  Tre/ot  TWV  ' ITTTTOK/OCXTO vs  KCU  nXarwvos 
Aoy/xarcav  (On  the  dogmas  of  Hippocrates  and  Plato).  In 
Philosophy  he  was  a  follower  of  Aristotle,  but  he  united  some 
of  the  best  things  in  Neoplatonism  with  the  traditional 


42  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful     CHAP,  vi 

teachings  of  the  Stagirite.  In  the  5th  section  of  the  above 
book,  Galen  writes  (he  is  speaking  of  Chrysippus)  :  "  He 
believes  that  Beauty  is  not  to  be  found  in  separate  things, 
taken  one  by  one,  but  in  the  symmetry  of  members,  e.g.  in 
the  suitable  arrangement  of  one  finger  with  another,  of  all 
the  fingers  with  the  palm  and  the  wrist,  of  palm  and  wrist 
with  the  elbow,  of  the  elbow  with  the  arm,  and  in  fact  of  all 
the  members  with  each  other,  as  is  laid  down  in  the  canon 
of  Polycleitus." 

Philostratus,  who  belonged  to  the  second  and  third  cen- 
turies A.D. — who  wrote  the  life  of  Apollonius,  and  of  the 
Sophists  —  wrote  also  a  work  which  he  called  EIKOVCS 
(Imagines}.  In  this  he  explains  a  series  of  sixty- four 
paintings,  which  he  represents  as  existing  in  a  villa  in  which 
he  resided  near  Naples.  In  the  preface  he  says  that  a 
knowledge  of  human  Nature  is  necessary  for  supremacy,  or 
even  for  any  achievement  in  the  art  of  painting.  The 
genius  of  the  painter  must  make  the  outward  express  the 
inward.  He  must  understand  how  to  make  the  physical 
frame  express  the  mind  within  it.  He  refers  to  the  idea 
of  the  ancients  that  the  key  to  the  art  of  painting  is  to  be 
found  in  "symmetry,"  which  is  a  harmony  or  balance  of 
/  the  spheres  of  the  outward  and  the  inward  ;  and  traces  a 
parallel  between  the  art  of  poetry  and  the  art  of  painting. 

Maximus  Tyrius,  a  Greek  writer  of  the  age  of  the  Anto- 
nines — the  date  of  whose  birth  and  death  is  unknown — 
wrote  AiaAc^eis  (Dissertationes)  on  various  philosophical 
subjects.  He  is  chiefly  interesting  to  the  student  of  the 
history  of  art -theory  from  the  fact  that  he  endorsed  the 
root-principle  of  idealism,  that  the  beauty  which  painters 
give  us,  drawn  from  every  quarter,  is  a  beauty  which  it  is 
impossible  to  find  in  any  single  natural  body.  He  therefore 
held  that  Nature  was  inferior  to  Art. 


CHAPTER   VII 

MEDIEVALISM 

I.  The  Patristic  Writers 

DURING  the  long  period  of  medievalism — which  separates 
the  close  of  ancient  philosophy  from  the  rise  of  the  modern 
spirit  in  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries — there 
were  comparatively  few  writers  who  dealt  with  the  problem 
of  the  Beautiful,  or  seem  to  have  thought  it  worthy  of 
serious  treatment.  When  interest  in  knowledge  for  its  own 
sake  had  dwindled,  and  the  stream  of  civilisation  was 
stopped  in  certain  quarters  altogether,  and  in  others  made 
artificial  by  alien  causes,  it  was  not  to  be  expected  that 
much  interest  should  be  taken  either  in  Nature  or  in  Art. 
In  traversing  those  centuries,  and  seeking  for  any  casual 
notices  of  the  subject  in  out-of-the-way  treatises,  we  must, 
as  Hegel  says,  put  on  seven-league  boots,  or  perhaps  one 
might  rather  say  that  we  must  make  a  flying  leap  from 
century  to  century. 

As  soon,  however,  as  we  see  any  sign  of  a  revival  of 
Philosophy,  within  the  shelter  of  Catholicism,  interest  in 
the  problem  of  the  beautiful  returned  as  one  of  its  elements. 
It  was  present  as  a  latent  factor,  influencing  all  other 
problems  more  or  less,  although  it  scarcely  showed  itself 
in  the  active  discussion  of  the  schools. 

Passing  over  Clemens  Alexandrinus,  who  touched  its 
margin  in  his  Paedagogus  (iii.  i),  the  most  important  treat- 
ment of  the  subject  in  Patristic  literature  was  by  St.  August- 
ine. At  the  age  of  twenty-six  or  twenty-seven  he  wrote  a 


44  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

little  book  De  Apto  et  Pulchro.  It  was  his  earliest  work,  and 
he  dedicated  it  to  a  Roman  orator,  Hierius.  The  book 
has  unfortunately  perished.  In  his  Epistolae,  Book  i.  3,  St. 
Augustine  writes  :  "  Quid  est  corporis  pulchritude  ?  Con- 
gruentia  partium  cum  quadam  coloris  suavitate."  In  the 
Confessiones,  he  followed  Socrates  in  identifying  the  beauti- 
ful with  the  useful.  "  Videbain  in  ipsis  corporibus  aliud 
esse  quasi  totum,  et  ideo  pulchrum ;  aliud  autem  quod 
ideo  deceret,  quoniam  apte  accommodaretur  alicui,  sicut 
pars  corporis  ad  universum  suum"  (lib.  iv.  cap.  13).  There 
is  another  passage  in  which  he  modifies  his  teaching  thus  : 
"  Pulchrum  esse  quod  per  se  ipsum  ;  aptum  autem  quod 
ad  aliquid  accommodatum  deceret"  (lib.  iv.  cap.  15).  His 
views  on  music  are  to  be  found  in  his  De  Vera  Religione, 
and  De  Musica.  St.  Augustine  was  a  Christian  Platonist, 
who  regarded  the  Divine  Nature  as  the  fountainhead  of 
Beauty  ;  and,  in  a  slightly  Neoplatonic  fashion,  he  taught 
that  in  our  approach  to  and  contact  with  the  fountainhead, 
Beauty  is  disclosed  to  man  directly. 

About  a  hundred  years  after  St.  Augustine,  we  find  a 
scholar  of  the  fourth  century,  a  man  of  real  genius,  but  an 
eccentric  virtuoso  and  dilettante — Cassiodorius  (468-562  ?) 
—  who  wrote  many  works  on  many  themes.  Amongst 
these  was  one  on  Liberal  Studies,  which  was  a  sort 
of  compendium  of  the  Seven  Arts  (which  were  supposed 
to  exhaust  the  curriculum  of  knowledge),  and  which  was 
for  a  long  time  an  authority  in  the  Middle  Ages.  He 
discussed  the  subject  of  the  Beautiful  very  imperfectly. 
And  not  much  more  can  be  said  of  Martianus  Capella 

(490 ),  whose  work  was  a  sort  of  encyclopedic  analysis, 

summarising  the  knowledge  of  the  Middle  Ages,  in  which 
the  principles  of  the  seven  Liberal  Arts,  which  were  supposed 
to  be  the  omne  scibile^  are  discussed.  It  is  an  ill-assorted 
miscellany. 

2.  The  Thirteenth  Century 

Scattered  through  the  writings  of  the  subtlest  thinker 
of  mediaevalism,  Thomas  Aquinas  (1227-1274),  there  are 


VII 


Medievalism  45 


reflections  on  the  subject  of  Beauty,  which  some  of  his  dis- 
ciples regard  as  the  profoundest  in  philosophical  literature. 
The  Abbe  P.  Vallet,  for  example  (see  p.  133),  has  written 
an  elaborate  work,  LIdee  du  Beau,  dans  la  philosophic 
de  Saint  Thomas  d'Aquin.  In  almost  every  word  of  his 
master,  Vallet  finds  the  germs  of  a  theory.  The  discussion 
on  "  Pulchritudo  "  in  the  Summa  is  meagre ;  but  Aquinas 
wrote  "  De  Pulchro  "  in  his  Opuscula,  and  there  are  sentences 
in  his  commentary  on  Lombard's  Book  of  the  Sentences,  in 
his  Contra  Gentes,  and  elsewhere,  which,  when  taken  to- 
gether, and  mutually  compared,  yield  a  tolerably  complete 
doctrine  of  Beauty.  There  is,  of  course,  a  great  risk  of  our 
reading  later  developments  of  thought  into  Aquinas,  just  as 
he  used  sometimes  to  interpret  both  his  "  philosophus " 
(Aristotle),  the  Hebrew,  and  the  Christian  books ;  but 
whatever  we  make  of  his  theory,  we  may  agree  with  P. 
Vallet  that  he  opens  up  to  us  "  immense  horizons "  of 
thought. 

Perhaps  the  two  aphorisms  of  Aquinas  which  are  most 
to  the  point  are  "  Pulchritudo  habet  claritatem  "  (Comm.  in 
Sent.  I.  dist.  31,  q.  2,  s.  i)  and  "Ratio  pulchri  consistit 
in  quadam  consonantia  diversorum "  (Opusc.  de  Pulchro]. 
He  also  defines  Pulchritudo  as  "  Resplendentia  formae 
super  partes  materiae  proportionatas  vel  super  diversas  vires, 
vel  actiones."  This  resplendentia  formae,  the  brilliance,  or 
eclat,  communicated  to  matter  by  the  ideal  form  it  assumes, 
and  by  which  it  is  clothed  as  well  as  permeated,  is  a  very 
significant  feature  of  the  Beautiful ;  and,  as  stated  by 
Aquinas,  it  is  a  characteristic  attempt  to  define  the  ultimate 
mystery.  In  the  Summa  he  says:  "Ad  pulchritudinem 
tria  requiruntur ;  primo  quidem  integritas,  sive  perfectio  ; 
quae  enim  diminuta  sunt,  hoc  ipso  turpia  sunt "  (I.  qu.  39). 
In  the  5th  quaestio  in  1°  he  defines  Perfectio  thus  :  "  Illud 
est  perfectum,  cui  nihil  deest  secundum  modum  suae  per- 
fectionis."  Again :  "  Tune  unaquaque  res  optime  disponitur, 
cum  ad  suum  finem  convenienter  ordinatur.  Finis  enim 
uniuscujus  est  bonum"  (Cont.  Gent,  proeem.  c.  i).  Again, 
in  the  De  Pulchro :  "  As  for  beauty  of  body,  a  certain  fit 
proportion  of  members,  and  colour  superadded,  is  necessary 


46  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

— without  which  there  is  no  beauty — so  for  Beauty  uni- 
versally, to  the  proportion  of  the  parts  and  of  the  whole 
there  must  be  added  a  certain  '  claritas  formae.' "  Again  : 
"  Pulchritudo  non  consistit  in  componentibus,  sicut  in 
materialibus,  sed  in  resplendentia  formae  sicut  in  formali; 
et  haec  est  quasi  differentia  specifica,  complens  rationem 
pulchri."  Again  :  "  Pulchrum  nunquam  separatur  a  bono, 
sicut  pulchrum  corporis  a  bono  corporis,  et  pulchrum  animae 
a  bono  animae." 

There  are  passages  in  the  Convito  and  in  the  Vita 
Nuova  (§  20)  of  Dante  (1265-1321),  and  also  in  the  Divina 
Commedia,  bearing  indirectly  on  the  subject  of  the  Beautiful ; 
but  the  subject  was  grasped  by  him  intuitively,  not  dis- 
cussed speculatively.  In  his  grief  for  Beatrice  he  turned 
to  Philosophy  for  consolation  ;  and  seeking  for  silver,  he 
found  gold.  But  it  was  not  into  the  sphere  of  abstractions 
that  Dante  rose,  by  the  help  of  the  philosophic  formulae  of 
the  understanding.  He  ascended  to  a  higher  realm  by  the 
sheer  force  of  intuition.  By  "  the  power  of  a  peculiar  eye," 
he  saw  separate  things  embraced  within  a  higher  unity,  that 
"  unity  where  no  division  is." 

3.  The  Fifteenth  Century 

Dante's  great  successor,  Savonarola  (1452-1498) — for 
successor  he  was  in  the  illustrious  brotherhood,  not  only  of 
"the  makers  of  Florence,"  but  of  the  great  men  of  the 
Italian  renaissance — was  pre-eminently  a  religious  teacher ; 
and  it  has  even  been  supposed  that  he  was  an  iconoclast  as 
regards  the  Fine  Arts.  This  is  unjust,  and  has  led  a 
perfervid  admirer,  M.  Rio,  to  represent  him,  in  his  Art 
Chretien,  as  a  sort  of  reviver  of  Christian  as  opposed  to 
Pagan  art.  The  latter  is  a  preposterous  statement, 
although  the  breach  between  Savonarola  and  the  natural- 
istic art,  which  was  chiefly  in  vogue  with  the  Medici,  did 
not  lead  the  former  into  any  opposition  to  Art  in  general. 
The  classical  renaissance,  which  Cosmo  de  Medici 
favoured,  was  a  type  of  art  that  had  departed  far  from 
the  ideal  of  Fra  Angelico  ;  and  it  was  to  that  earlier  ideal, 


vii  Medicevalism  47 

enhanced  by  the  robuster  qualities  of  Buonarotti,  that 
Savonarola  turned.  He  did  more,  however,  than  sympa- 
thise with  a  new  ideal  of  Art.  He  also  spoke  and  wrote 
on  the  subject  of  the  Beautiful.  In  one  of  his  sermons, 
for  the  third  Sunday  in  Lent,  he  asked,  "  In  what  does 
Beauty  consist  ?  In  colour  ?  No.  In  Form  ?  No. 
Beauty,  as  regards  composite  things,  is  born  of  the 
correspondence  of  parts  and  colours.  The  beauty  of 
simple  things  is  in  their  light.  Behold  the  sun  and  the 
stars,  their  beauty  is  in  the  light  they  shed  ;  behold,  the 
spirits  of  the  blessed,  their  beauty  consists  of  light ; 
behold,  God  is  light.  He  is  Beauty  itself.  The  beauty  of 
man  and  woman  is  greater  and  more  perfect  the  more 
resemblance  it  hath  to  primary  beauty.  What  then  is  j 
this  Beauty  ?  It  is  a  quality  resulting  from  the  proportion  | 
and  correspondence  of  the  members  and  parts  of  the  body. 
Thou  dost  not  call  a  woman  beautiful  on  account  of  her 
beautiful  nose  or  hands,  but  when  all  is  in  harmony.  What 
is  the  source  of  this  beauty?  On  investigation,  thou  wilt 
see  that  it  emanates  from  the  soul."  It  is,  as  in  another 
sermon  he  says,  when  the  soul  shines  in  the  beauty  of  God,  j 
that  a  divine  charm  is  given  to  the  body.  \ 

To  Savonarola  the  moral  and  religious  interest  was 
supreme,  but  he  wrote  a  small  book  on  the  "  Division  and 
Utility  of  all  the  Sciences,"  in  reply  to  a  request  from  his 
scholar  friend  Agolino  Verino,  one  section  of  which  is 
"An  apology  for  the  art  of  Poetry."  His  aim  in  the  little 
book  was  to  show  that  poetry,  like  every  other  branch  of 
culture,  had  its  place  of  value.  He  held  that  the  essence 
of  Poetry  was  philosophic  thought,  but  that  the  purpose 
of  Poetry  was  to  persuade  by  example.  He  then  proceeds, 
however,  most  narrowly  to  denounce  the  classical  poets  of 
antiquity,  and  would  have  had  them  all  as  ruthlessly  con- 
demned, and  their  works  placed  in  an  index  expurgatorius, 
as  Plato  would  have  had  them  banished  from  his  ideal 
Republic. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  the  general  strain  of  the 
teaching  of  Savonarola  was  alien  to  an  appreciation  of 
the  Beautiful.  It  could  hardly  have  been  otherwise.  He 


48  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

had  other,  and  relatively  to  his  day  perhaps  more  important 
work  to  do. 

No  other  writer,  either  of  the  earlier  or  the  later 
medievalism,  dealt  with  the  theory  of  Beauty ;  and  one  of 
the  most  distinctive  features  of  those  centuries  now  known 
as  the  "  Dark,"  was  the  want  of  an  appreciation  of  the 
Beautiful,  whether  in  art  or  in  life,  its  absence  from  the 
thought,  the  style,  and  the  character  of  the  times. 

Albrecht  Diirer  (1471-1528)  was  perhaps  the  first 
European  artist  who  studied  Nature  carefully,  for  its  own 
sake,  and  with  a  view  to  make  it  a  subject  for  Art.  He 
was  the  founder  of  the  landscape  art  of  Europe,  although 
also  and  eminently  a  figure  painter.  He  had  studied 
Vitruvius  (see  p.  40),  and  himself  elaborated  a  theory  of 
proportion,  of  which  he  wrote,  and  which  he  tried  to 
practise.  His  two  chief  works  were  his  Book  of  Measure- 
ments and  Book  of  Human  Proportions.  In  these  he  did 
not,  however,  lay  down  any  dogmatic  proposition  as  to 
Beauty.  He  saw  the  immense  variety  of  its  types,  noting 
even  that  two  human  figures  might  both  be  beautiful,  and 
yet  neither  resemble  the  other,  in  any  single  point  or  part. 
He  said:  "No  man  liveth  who  can  grasp  the  whole  beauty  of 
the  meanest  living  creature."  ..."  Men  deliberate,  and 
hold  numberless  different  opinions  about  Beauty,  and  they 
seek  after  it  in  many  different  ways.  I  certainly  know  not 
what  the  ultimate  measure  of  true  Beauty  is  ...  but  we 
must  find  perfect  form  and  Beauty  in  '  the  sum  of  all.'  "... 
"  I  have  heard  how  the  seven  sages  of  Greece  taught  a 
man  that  measure  is  in  all  things  (physical  and  moral)  the 
best.  Those  arts  and  methods  which  most  approximate  to 
measurement  are  the  noblest."  ..."  Beauty  dependeth 
upon  many  things.  When  we  wish  to  bring  it  into  our 
work,  we  find  it  very  hard.  We  must  gather  it  together 
from  far  and  wide.  .  .  .  Out  of  many  beautiful  things 
something  good  may  be  extracted,  even  as  honey  is 
gathered  from  many  flowers.  The  true  mean  lieth  between 
too  much  and  too  little.  ...  I  apply  to  what  is  to  be 
called  beautiful  the  same  touchstone  as  that  by  which  I 
decide  what  is  right  "  (MS.  Brit.  Mus.  IV.).  Diirer  else- 


VII 


Medi&valism  49 


where  wrote  :  "  Use  is  a  part  of  Beauty,"  and  "  The  accord 
of  one  thing  with  another  is  beautiful."  More  important 
are  his  words:  "Depart  not  from  Nature,  neither  imagine 
of  thyself  to  invent  aught  better,  for  Art  standeth  firmly 
fixed  in  Nature,  and  whoso  can  thence  rend  her  forth,  he 
only  possesseth  her."  "  We  find  in  Nature  a  Beauty  so  far 
surpassing  our  understanding,  that  not  one  of  us  can  fully 
bring  it  into  his  work."  i 


CHAPTER   VIII 

THE   PHILOSOPHY   OF   GERMANY 
i.  Leibnitz  to  Lessing 

IN  the  philosophy  of  Leibnitz  (1646-1716),  who  led  the 
idealistic  reaction  in  Germany  along  a  track  of  his  own,  we 
have  no  explicit  discussion  of  the  problem  of  the  Beautiful ; 
but  some  of  the  most  characteristic  features  of  the  Leibnitzian 
teaching  gave  rise  to,  and  reappear  in,  the  subsequent 
'  aesthetik '  of  Germany.  Leibnitz  held  that  we  rise  from  a 
sort  of  sub-consciousness,  or  confused  groping,  into  the 
explicit  realisation  of  things.  An  indistinct  perception 
yields  to  a  distinct  one  ;  and,  although  there  is  a  differ- 

A  ence,  there  is  no  chasm  between  the  two.  The  clear  per- 
ception of  the  harmony  of  the  Universe  is  an  intellectual  or 

(  scientific  grasp  of  it ;  but,  in  the  vague  or  obscure  realisa- 

\  tion  of  the  same,  we  perceive  its  beauty.  Thus,  the 
perception  of  Beauty  is  an  unconscious  or  half-conscious 
discernment  of  harmony  ;  and  our  knowledge  of  the  true 
and  the  beautiful  is  distinguished  simply  as  the  clear  and 
the  dim  perception  of  the  same  thing.  (Cf.  Principes  de 

*la  Nature,  etc.,  1714.)  As  one  of  the  most  appreciative  of 
Leibnitzian  scholars  puts  it,  the  sphere  of  the  Beautiful  in 
poetry  and  art  is  "on  the  borderland  of  the  unconscious  and 
conscious  ;  it  lies  in  the  twilight  of  the  perceiving  and 
sentient  soul.  The  great  world  of  the  petites  perceptions,  the 
half-illuminated  storehouse  of  our  mind,  where  the  ideas 
hover  when  they  merge  out  of  darkness  into  full  light — this 
is  the  home  of  the  Beautiful"  (J.  T.  Merz,  Leibniz,  p.  185). 


CHAP,  vin        The  Philosophy  of  Germany  51 

It  is  only  the  germ  of  a  doctrine  of  the  Beautiful,  how- 
ever, that  is  to  be  found  in  Leibnitz.  The  first  to 
elaborate  a  theory  on  the  subject  was  Alexander  Gottlieb 
Baumgarten  (1714-1762).  He  was  the  younger  of  two 
brothers,  both  of  whom  became  teachers  at  Halle.  Reared 
in  a  school  which  was  prejudiced  against  both  Wolff  and 
Leibnitz,  he  ultimately  became  their  intellectual  disciple. 
He  developed  the  Wolfian  doctrine,  however,  along  a 
special  line ;  and,  although  he  discussed  Philosophy  in 
almost  all  its  aspects,  he  will  probably  be  remembered 
chiefly  as  having  been  the  first  in  Germany  to  call  attention 
to  Beauty  as  a  distinct  branch  of  knowledge.  His  book — 
which  virtually  created  the  science  in  Germany — was  called 
Aesthetica^  and  published  at  Frankfort  on  the  Oder  in  1750, 
republished  in  1758. 

Baumgarten  identified  the  Beautiful  with  the  perfect, 
and  defined  it  very  vaguely  as  Perfection  apprehended 
through  the  channel  of  sense.  He  classified  the  provinces 
of  philosophical  inquiry  as  respectively  those  of  the  True, 
the  Beautiful,  and  the  Good.  Cousin's  classification  of 
them  (Du  Vrai,  du  Beau,  et  du  Bien)  was  derived  from 
Baumgarten  ;  but  the  latter  distinguished  the  True  (or  the 
sphere  of  Logic)  from  the  Beautiful  (or  the  sphere  of 
Esthetic)  simply  as  two  sections  of  knowledge,  the  former 
of  which  was  clear,  and  the  latter  obscure.  In  contrast 
with  the  clear  knowledge  which  Logic  gives,  Esthetics 
gives  us  only  dim  or  confused  knowledge  (verworrene 
Vorstellungen).  ^Esthetic  is  at  one  and  the  same  time, 
however,  perception  through  the  senses,  and  a  discernment 
of  the  Beautiful,  the  scientia  cognitionis  sensilivae  being  the 
same  as  ars  pulchre  cogitandi\  the  facultas  dejudicandi 
enabling  us  to  see  unity  in  variety,  or  agreement  in 
difference.1  Baumgarten  wholly  ignored  the  side  of  feeling, 
or  emotion,  in  the  apprehension  of  the  Beautiful,  em- 
phasising the  intellectual  side  only.  His  adoption  of 
Leibnitz's  doctrines  of  optimism  and  pre-established  harmony 

1  Baumgarten' s  treatise  begins :  "  Aesthetica  .  .  .  ars  pulchre  cogi- 
tandi  .  .  .  est  scientia  cognitionis  sensitivae."  Again  he  says:  "  Per- 
fectio  cognitionis  sensitivae  ...  est  pulchritudo." 


52  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

led  him  into  a  sort  of  esthetic  fatalism,  which  harked  back 
to  the  Aristotelian  doctrine  that,  as  it  is  in  Nature  that  we 
find  the  highest  disclosure  of  the  Beautiful,  the  chief  pur- 
pose of  Art  is  to  imitate  Nature.  Baumgarten  recognised 
the  Beautiful  as  an  intellectual  element  existing  in  Nature, 
but  he  did  not  connect  it  with  the  life  of  Nature  or  the 
anima  mundi.  Had  he  done  so,  he  would  have  seen  that 
it  is  not  to  be  identified  with  the  actual  (i)  because  life 
and  change  are  synonymous,  and  (2)  because  the  vital 
type  is  kept  up,  and  is  even  strengthened,  by  specific 
departures  from  it  in  individual  cases. 

A  pupil  of  Baumgarten,  and  his  biographer,  Friedrich 
Meier  (1718-1777),  developed  his  doctrine  in  his  Anfangs- 
griinde  der  Schbnen  Wissenschaften  (1748).  It  was  at 
his  instigation  that  Baumgarten  gave  his  Aesthetica  to  the 
world,  and  Meier  cared  more  for  this  than  for  any  other 
part  of  his  master's  philosophy.  He  opposed  the  realistic 
'teaching  of  the.  Aristotelians  of  his  day — Batteux,  etc. — 
that  successful  art  is  an  imitation  of  Nature  ;  and  held  that 
in  objective  Beauty  we  see  perfection  mirrored  to  us,  so  far 
as  that  is  possible,  in  sensuous  forms. 

Friedrich  Nicolai  (1733-1811),  of  "  Universal  Library" 
fame,  began  his  literary  career  by  writing  Letters  tipon  the 
Present  State  of  the  Fine  Arts  in  Germany  (1755),  but 
although  he  had  been  a  pupil  of  Baumgarten,  and  imbibed 
his  spirit,  and  although  his  chief  interest  was  in  the  depart- 
ment of  aesthetic,  he  contributed  nothing  to  the  advance- 
ment of  philosophical  theory. 

Some  years  afterwards  (1771),  Johann  Georg  Sulzer 
(1720-1777)  wrote  a  theory  of  the  Fine  Arts,  Allgemeine 
Theorie  der  Schonen  Kunste.  He  followed  Wolff,  in  finding 
the  essence  of  Beauty  in  perfection,  which  was  also  the  one 
in  the  manifold ;  and  he  points  out  that,  as  things  are 
beautiful  in  themselves,  and  not  merely  in  subjective  taste, 
aesthetic  pleasure  is  much  higher  than  any  sense  enjoyment 
can  be.  Although  his  book  went  through  four  editions, 
and  was  subsequently  added  to  by  three  of  his  literary 
friends,  as  well  as  translated  into  French,  Sulzer's  was,  on 
the  whole,  a  sterile  discussion.  It  is  somewhat  curious 


vin  The  Philosophy  of  Germany  53 

that  for  many  a  year  the  Germans  considered  Sulzer  their 
chief  authority  in  the  subject  of  the  Beautiful,  although  he 
did  not  advance  aesthetic  theory  beyond  the  position  to 
which  it  was  raised  a  decade  earlier  by  his  friend  Breitinger 
in  his  preface  to  J.  J.  Bodmer's  Critische  Betrachtungen  iiber 
die  poetischen  Gemdlde  der  Dichter  (1741). 

In  1764,  Johann  Joachim  Winckelmann  (1717-1768) 
published  his  Geschichle  der  Kunst  des  Alterthums.  This 
was  the  first  German  work  on  the  history  of  Art,  and  was 
almost  an  epoch-making  book.  Winckelmann  was  a 
Prussian,  educated  first  at  Dresden,  and  afterwards  at 
Rome,  where  he  lived  with  Cardinal  Albani,  and  was  made 
prasfect  of  antiquities  in  the  city.  Amid  the  ruins  of  the 
world  of  Ancient  Art,  in  the  metropolis  of  Italy,  he  planned 
the  work,  which  gave  his  countrymen  their  earliest  and  what 
is  still  one  of  the  freshest  delineations  of  that  world.  It  might 
without  exaggeration  be  defined  as  a  divination  of  the  spirit 
of  Hellenic  Art  by  a  nature  of  kindred  simplicity,  penetra- 
tion, and  strength.  One  chapter  of  his  book  is  entitled 
"The  Essential  in  Art,"  and  in  it  he  discusses  the  nature 
of  the  Beautiful.  He  finds  it  easier — as  many  others  had 
done — to  say  what  it  is  not,  than  what  it  is  ;  but  he  tells  us 
that,  during  all  his  historical  studies  in  Greek  Art,  Beauty 
seemed  to  beckon  to  him.  "  I  cast  my  eyes  down  before  it, 
as  did  those  to  whom  the  Highest  appeared,  believing  that 
I  saw  the  Highest  in  this  vision."  He  tried  to  unite  all 
single  beauties  into  one  figure.  He  failed  in  this  ;  but  he 
recognised  the  truly  beautiful — which  was  felt  by  sense,  but 
recognised  by  the  understanding — as  one,  and  not  manifold. 
He  held  that  the  essence  of  Beauty  consists,  not  in  colour, 
but  in  shape — colour  might  assist  it,  but  did  not  constitute 
it — and  further,  that  Beauty  is  different  from  that  which 
merely  pleases  or  charms  us.  A  person  or  an  object  might 
possess  charm  without  being  beautiful.  He  rejected  the! 
theory  that  Beauty  lies  in  the  harmony  of  any  single 
thing  with  the  object  of  its  being,  or  in  the  harmony  of  the 
parts  of  a  thing  with  the  whole  of  it ;  and  held  that  the 
highest  Beauty  was  "  like  an  essence  extracted  from  matter 
by  fire."  It  was  always  heightened  by  simplicity,  and  there 


54  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

was  also  the  absence  of  individuality  in  it,  so  far  as  in- 
dividual traits  introduce  an  element  of  limitation.  In  this 
!  connection  Winckelmann  made  use  of  the  figure,  Beauty 
should  be  "  like  the  best  kind  of  water,  drawn  from  a 
spring  :  the  less  taste  it  has,  the  more  healthful  it  is,  because 
free  from  foreign  admixture."  Since  all  individual  objects 
had  some  fault  or  defect,  the  excellence  of  ancient  Art 
seemed  to  him  to  consist  in  this,  that  "  as  the  bee  gathers 
from  many  flowers,  so  were  the  ideas  of  beauty  brought 
together  from  many  different  quarters."  The  selection  of 
the  most  beautiful  elements,  and  their  harmonious  union, 
produced  the  ideal,  which  was  the  highest  possible  beauty, 
and  which  existed,  not  in  outward  nature,  but  in  the  mind 
alone. 

Winckelmann  found  it  easier  to  say  where  Beauty  resides, 
than  to  tell  us  in  what  it  consists.  He  selected  "  the  youthful 
form,  in  which  everything  is  and  is  yet  to  come,  in  which  it 
appears  and  yet  does  not  appear."  It  is  obvious  that  this 
is  a  partial  theory,  from  the  fact  that  there  is  beauty  in 
maturity,  as  well  as  in  youth,  and  even  in  extreme  age.  In 
addition,  it  is  narrowed  by  its  limitation  to  beauty  of  form, 
or  mere  outline.  He  did  not  take  account  of  expression,  or 
the  incarnation  of  thought  and  feeling  through  form.  His 
illustration  of  Beauty  as  pure  spring  water  is  the  root  of  a 
fallacy.  Ideal  Beauty  according  to  that  symbol  would  be 
stiff  and  inflexible,  a  rigid  uniform  entity.  The  theory  was 
acutely  criticised  by  Hermann  Hettner  in  the  Revue  Moderne, 
January  1866. 

Winckelmann's  theory,  however,  and  his  critical  estimate 
of  Greek  art,  had  an  effect  far  beyond  the  department  to 
which  his  book  was  devoted ;  and  we  find  it  telling  soon  on 
the  literary,  the  philosophical,  and  the  archaeological  study 
of  his  time.  It  suggested  much,  for  example,  to  Lessing. 
The  charm  of  his  really  great  book  is  that  Winckelmann  was 
no  mere  archaeologist,  or  dry  chronicler  of  facts,  but  an 
ardent  enthusiast  for  the  Beautiful,  a  philosophic  poet,  who 
loved  Beauty  for  its  own  sake. 

In  1769,  five  years  after  the  Geschichte  der  Kunst 
des  Alterthums  appeared,  Gotthold  Ephraim  Lessing 


viii  The  PJiilosophy  of  Germany  55 

(1729-1781)  published  his  Laokoon,  one  of  the  finest 
fragments  of  aesthetic  criticism  in  the  literature  of  Ger- 
many. It  was  directed  against  the  idea  embodied  in  the 
maxim  sit  ut  pictura  poema,  and  its  purpose  was  to  bring 
out  the  distinction  of  the  plastic  arts  from  poetry.  Lessing 
may  be  described  as  an  eighteenth -century  Aristotelian, 
who  maintained  that  the  function  of  Art  was  solely  and 
simply  to  reflect  the  Beautiful.  But  he  points  out  that  the 
Greek  artists  would  paint  nothing  but  the  beautiful.  They 
were  idealists  in  the  sense  that  they  would  not  reproduce 
the  real  if  it  was  ugly.  "  Who  would  paint  you,  when  nobody 
will  look  at  you  ? "  expresses  the  rule  of  their  work.  He 
has  drawn  out  the  provinces  of  Poetry  and  Painting  in  the 
Laokoon  with  much  felicity.  As  sculpture  and  painting 
represent  what  is  coexistent  and  permanent,  they  are  more 
limited  than  poetry  is.  Form  and  colour  have  no  range 
at  all  comparable  to  that  which  Poetry  can  traverse  ;  the 
scope  of  the  latter  being  practically  limitless. 

The  name  of  Anton  Raphael  Mengs  (1728-1779)  should 
be  mentioned  here  in  passing.  He  was  a  German  artist ; 
court  painter  to  Augustus,  King  of  Saxony  ;  a  friend  of 
Winckelmann  (to  whom  he  was  of  great  service  at  Rome)  ; 
and  a  writer  on  art.  His  definition  of  Beauty,  however, 
was  vague  enough,  "  visible  perfection,  an  imperfect  image 
of  the  supreme  perfection." 

2.  Mendelssohn  to  Kant 

In  1783  a  friend  of  Nicolai,  Johann  August  Eberhard 
(1739-1809),  published  a  Theory  of  the  Fine  Arts  and 
Sciences,  and  in  1803-1805  a  Handbook  of  ^Esthetics  in 
four  volumes.  These  works  call  for  no  special  remark. 

A  much  more  important  writer  was  Moses  Mendelssohn 
(1726-1786),  who  must  be  regarded  as  the  intermediate 
link  between  Lessing  and  Kant.  In  his  Morgenstunden 
(1785),  Mendelssohn  called  attention  to  a  feature  of  the 
Beautiful  which  Kant  adopted,  or  to  which  he  was  at  least 
much  indebted,  in  the  working  out  of  his  greater  theory. 
"  It  is  customary,"  he  writes,  "  to  distinguish  the  cognitive 


56  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

faculty  from  the  faculty  of  desire,  and  to  include  the  feelings 
of  pleasure  under  the  latter.  Between  cognition  and  desire, 
however,  it  seems  to  me  there  lies  that  satisfaction  of  the 
soul  which  is  widely  separated  from  desire.  We  look  upon 
the  Beauty  in  Nature  and  Art  with  pure  pleasure  and  satis- 
faction. This  is  a  mark  of  the  Beautiful  that  we  contemplate 
it  with  quiet  satisfaction.  It  pleases  us  though  we  do  not 
possess  it,  and  can  never  possibly  make  use  of  it.  When 
we  think  of  a  beautiful  thing  in  relation  to  ourselves,  then 
desire  to  have  it  springs  up,  but  not  till  then  ;  but  this 
desire  to  possess  is  very  different  from  the  enjoyment  of  the 
Beautiful  itself." 

In  an  earlier  work  On  the  Main  Principles  of  the  Fine 
Arts  and  Sciences,  and  On  the  Sublime  and  Naive  in  the 
Arts  and  Sciences  (1761),  Mendelssohn  drew  a  fruitful  dis- 
tinction between  the  symbols  which  the  several  Arts 
employ,  and  the  aims  they  have  in  view. 

We  come  now  to  a  greater  name  in  German  philosophy 
than  any  of  the  preceding.  The  general  aim  of  the  philo- 
sophy of  Kant  (1724-1804)  was  to  establish  the  principles 
of  knowledge  on  an  a  priori  basis.  The  Kantian  is  the 
critical  philosophy  par  excellence,  inasmuch  as  it  criticises 
experience  with  a  view  to  show  that  it  contains  elements 
that  are  anterior  to,  and  underived  from,  experience.  In 
1781  the  Critic  of  the  Pure  Reason  appeared  ;  seven  years 
later,  the  Critic  of  the  Practical  Reason  ;  which  was  followed 
in  1790  by  the  Critic  of  Judgment.  It  is  in  this  last  work 
(the  Kritik  der  Urteilskraff)  that  Kant  discusses  the  nature 
of  Beauty  and  Sublimity. 

Writing  to  his  friend  Reinhold  he  said :  "  I  am  at  pre- 
sent engaged  on  a  critique  of  Taste,  and  I  have  been  in 
this  way  led  to  the  discovery  of  another  kind  of  a  priori 
principles  than  I  had  formerly  recognised.  For  the  faculties 
of  the  mind  are  three  —  the  faculty  of  knowledge,  the 
faculty  of  pleasure  and  pain,  and  the  will.  I  have  dis- 
covered the  a  pi  iori  principles  for  the  first  of  these  in  the 
Critic  of  the  Pure  Reason,  and  for  the  third  in  the  Critic  of 
the  Practical  Reason  ;  but  my  search  for  such  a  similar  prin- 
ciple for  the  second  seemed  at  first  fruitless.  ...  I  now 


viii  The  Pliilosophy  of  Germany  57 

recognise  three  parts  of  Philosophy,  each  of  which  has  its 
own  a  priori  principles." 

This  recognition  by  Kant  of  three  equivalent  and  equally 
important  departments  of  philosophy  is  noteworthy  ;  and  he 
seems  to  have  regarded  the  third  and  last  as  a  sort  of  con- 
necting link  between  the  other  two.  In  the  intellectual 
sphere,  reason  is  the  faculty  which  traverses  the  ground  to  be 
explored  ;  within  the  moral  sphere  the  will  is  the  faculty  ; 
but  "we  can  feel  what  we  can  neither  know  nor  will"; 
and  by  this  mediating  principle  Kant  thought  that  we  get  a 
link  of  connection  between  the  phenomenal  and  the  real. 
When  we  cannot  penetrate  to  the  world  beyond  phenomena 
by  the  exercise  of  reason,  and  while  the  energy  of  the  will 
is  of  necessity  quite  subjective,  we  may  be  conscious  of 
objects  beyond  us,  which  create  a  certain  harmony  within 
us.  The  aesthetic  line  of  inquiry  is  therefore  not  only 
different  from  the  intellectual  and  the  moral,  it  is  the  only 
pathway  that  conducts  us  to  the  terra  firma  of  objective 
and  substantial  reality. 

In  his  Critic  of  Jtcdgment  Kant's  first  endeavour  is  to 
find  out  the  a  priori  element  or  elements  in  our  aesthetic 
consciousness.  (i)  When  we  say  of  an  object  that  it  is 
beautiful,  we  are,  first  of  all,  conscious  of  pleasure  •  but  it 
is  a  disinterested  pleasure.  We  do  not  pronounce  it  to  be 
beautiful  because  we  wish  to  possess  it.  Our  only  desire 
is  to  be  in  its  presence,  and  to  know  more  about  it.  (2) 
Next,  we  recognise  that  others  as  well  as  ourselves  should 
thus  judge  of  it  and  feel  regarding  it.  We  universalise  our 
own  judgment  and  feelings  toward  it ;  and  we  do  this 
because  we  recognise  the  faculties  of  all  men  as  radically  or 
constitutionally  the  same.  We  can  only  say  that  others 
should  agree  with  us,  in  our  judgments  and  feelings  as  to 
beauty,  if  we  possess  a  common  nature.  (3)  Further,  when 
we  say  a  thing  is  beautiful,  we  express  the  relation  in  which 
it  (the  object)  stands  to  us  (the  subject)  ;  but  we  do  not 
pronounce  as  to  any  other  relation,  in  which  the  object 
before  us  stands  to  other  objects.  We  do  not  construe  any- 
thing as  beautiful  because  of  the  end  or  purpose  it  subserves 
(whether  objective  or  subjective),  although  we  may  perceive 


58  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

that  it  is  always  adapted  to  some  end.  We  judge  it  to  be 
beautiful  because  of  what  it  is  in  relation  to  ourselves.  It 
follows — and  here  we  come  to  an  illogical  inference — that 
Beauty  does  not  lie  in  the  power  which  objects  have  to 
move  us  ;  nor  does  it  consist  in  any  perfections  we  perceive 
to  exist  in  them.  We  call  them  beautiful  because  our 
faculties  work  harmoniously  in  regard  to  them. 

The  sublime  is  different  from  the  beautiful.  The  objects 
which  we  recognise  as  sublime  do  not  soothe  or  rest  our 
faculties,  but  stir  them.  They  excite  the  imagination  in  an 
indeterminate  manner.  The  beauty  in  objects  appeals  to  us 
directly  by  what  it  is,  the  sublime  appeals  to  us  indirectly 
by  what  it  suggests.  The  great  outlying  and  surrounding 
forces  of  Nature,  which  we  cannot  manipulate  or  resist  (but 
which  nevertheless  cannot  crush  us  under  them),  excite  in 
us  the  feeling  of  the  sublime.  The  sublime  may  be  a  quan- 
titative element  of  mere  magnitude.  We  may  go  on  adding 
element  to  element,  and  the  more  elements  we  take  in,  the 
greater  the  sublimity  ;  but  at  length  we  reach  a  limit,  and 
can  combine  no  more.  The  thought  of  the  Infinite,  as 
transcending  the  finite,  brings  in  the  sublime ;  and  the 
sublimity  of  the  Infinite  is  an  absolute  sublimity.  Another 
kind  is  relative.  An  object  may  be  great,  not  intrinsically, 
but  only  relatively  to  us  ;  while  we  do  not  feel  that  we  are 
altogether  subdued  before  it.  Finally,  the  recognition  of  a 
sublime  power  beyond  us  in  Nature  awakens  in  man  a  sense 
of  corresponding  power  within  him,  and  leads  him  to  find 
the  root  of  the  sublime  within  his  own  nature. 

Kant's  teaching  as  to  the  Beautiful  and  Sublime  was  an 
effort  to  unite  what  had  been  left  broken  up  and  divided  in 
his  two  previous  Kritiken.  He  saw  in  Nature  something 
that  resembled  human  reason  and  intelligence.  The  diffi- 
culty  was  to  find  the  connecting  link  between  them.  He 
held  that  the  only  ground  on  which  we  can  universalise  our 
judgments  as  to  the  Beautiful,  or  regard  them  as  valid  for 
others,  was  that  they  were  the  outcome  of  the  Universal 
Reason.  We  could  not  expect  any  one  to  agree  with  us  in 
our  judgments  as  to  Beauty  unless  we  ourselves  discerned 
this  universal  reason  in  Nature,  and  saw  in  it,  not  a  blank 


vin  The  Philosophy  of  Germany  59 

pleasure-producing  apparatus,  but  a  mirror  which  reflects  our  f 
own  nature  at  its  highest  point  of  development. 

It  is  in  this  act  of  universalising  our  experience  that  we 
transcend  the  subjective  and  phenomenal  sphere.  At  first 
all  is  subjective  and  phenomenal.  In  the  pure  disinterested 
pleasure  which  comes  to  us  ab  extra,  without  the  element  of 
desire,  we  do  not  transcend  the  phenomenal  sphere.  But 
whenever  we  say  that  this  Beauty,  which  gives  us  a  pure  dis- 
interested pleasure,  ought  to  please  others  also,  we  bring  in 
both  a  rational  and  an  objective  element.  We  could  not 
universalise  a  pleasant  thing  merely  because  it  was  pleasant. 
Recognising  something  in  us,  however,  that  is  common  to 
the  race,  and  something  in  each  member  of  the  race  that  is 
not  his  own,  but  is  universal  property,  we  are  freed  from 
our  former  confmedness  and  limitation. 

Kant's  system  of  Esthetic  is  far  from  complete.  Its 
defects  were  pointed  out  by  contemporary  critics  (notably 
by  Herder  in  his  Kalligone),  and  by  many  subsequent  ones.1 
Kant  made  the  charm,  or  that  which  pleases  us  in  beautiful 
things,  diametrically  distinct  from  the  Beauty  itself;  and 
hence  he  said  that  Colour  (which  pleases  the  eye)  is  an 
unessential  element  in  Beauty,  whereas  Form  is  of  its 
essence.  But  surely  form  "  pleases  the  eye,"  just  as  colour 
does  ;  and  the  sequences  of  sound  in  music,  and  its  har- 
monies, please  the  ear,  as  the  rhythmic  cadence  of  words  in 
poetry  does.  This  sharp  dualistic  separation  of  provinces  is 
faulty.  Compare  Friedlander's  criticism  of  Kant  in  the 
Preussi "sche  Jahrbilcher,  xx.  2.2 


3.  Herder  to  Humboldt 

The  work  of  Herder  (Johann  Gottfried,  1744-1803)  be- 
longs much  more  to  Literature  than  to  Philosophy,  although 
five  volumes  of  philosophical  writings  were  published  in  his 

1  Hegel  has  some  most  appreciative,  and  at  the  same  time  aptly 
critical  remarks  on  Kant's  theory. 

2  Kant  in  seinem  Verhdltniss  zur  Kunst  und  schonen  Natur.      See 
also  a  very  appreciative  estimate  in  Kant's  Begriindung  der  Aesthetik, 
by  Von  Hermann  Cohen,  of  Marburg  (1889). 


60  TJie  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

complete  works.  He  was  trained  by  Kant,  but  they 
diverged  widely  in  their  views  of  Nature.  In  his  Kalligone 
(1800)  this  difference  is  explicit,  although  in  his  Metakritik 
zur  Kritik  (published  in  1799)  the  antagonism,  and  even 
bitterness,  was  greater.  He  was  one  of  three  men,  younger 
contemporaries  of  Kant  (Harnann  and  Jacobi  being  the 
other  two),  who  emphasised  feeling  rather  than  reason,  as 
the  organ  by  which  we  obtain  a  direct  apprehension  of 
reality.  They  were  philosophical  mystics,  each  in  a 
different  way — Hamann,  in  his  Aesthetica  in  mice  ;  Herder, 
in  his  Kalligone  ;  and  Jacobi,  in  his  David  Hume,  etc. 

Kant's  great  contemporary,  Goethe  (1749-1832),  chief 
poet  of  Germany,  wrote  much  that  is  suggestive  on  the 
subject  of  the  Beautiful.  Casual  reflections  in  fugitive 
pieces,  detached  sayings  in  Wilhelm  Meister  and  other 
works,  stray  remarks  in  his  correspondence  with  Schiller, 
Reinhard,  Woltmann,  and  others,  and  in  the  conversations 
which  Eckermann,  Riemer,  and  Luden  have  recorded, 
show  that  he  sought  to  steer  a  wise  middle  course  between 
the  idealists  and  realists.  The  following  are  some  of  his 
almost  aphoristic  dicta  on  the  subject,  collected  from 
many  sources  : — "  The  Beautiful  is  an  elementary  pheno- 
menon, which  is  never  incorporated,  but  whose  reflex 
becomes  visible  in  a  thousand  various  revelations  of 
creative  genius,  as  various  indeed  as  Nature  herself. 
I  am  not  of  opinion  that  Nature  is  beautiful  in  all  her 
creations."  .  .  .  "  A  creation  is  beautiful  when  it  has  reached 
the  height  of  its  natural  development"  (in  that  period  of 
growth  which  perfectly  expresses  its  peculiar  character). 
"  Oeser  taught  me  that  the  ideal  of  Beauty  is  simplicity  and 
tranquillity."  "The  spirit  of  the  real  is  the  true  ideal,  but 
the  artist  is  higher  than  art,  and  higher  than  his  object." 
"  The  greatest  artists  are  boldest  in  the  royal  prerogative  of 
ennobling  the  vulgar,"  and  "  in  every  artist  there  are  germs 
of  audacity."  "  '  Beauty '  is  neither  light  nor  darkness  :  it 
is  twilight,  the  medium  between  truth  and  untruth.  .  .  . 
"  Beauty  is  inexplicable  :  it  is  a  hovering,  floating,  and 
glittering  shadow,  whose  outline  eludes  the  grasp  of  defini- 
tion." Goethe  did  not  believe  in  the  possibility  of  a  specula- 


vin  The  Philosophy  of  Germany  61 

tive  or  scientific  analysis  of  the  Beautiful.      He  puts  the  /> 
case  thus  : — "  Mendelssohn  and  others  tried  to  catch  Beauty  I 
as  a  butterfly,  and  pin  it  down  for  inspection.      They  have  j 
succeeded  in  the  same  way  as  they  are  likely  to  succeed 
with  a  butterfly.      The  poor  animal  trembles  and  struggles, 
and    its    brightest   colours  are   gone ;    or,    if  you   catch   it 
without  spoiling  the  colours,  you  have  at  best  a  stiff  and 
awkward  corpse.      But  a  corpse  wants  the  life  which  sheds 
beauty  on  everything."    Again  :  "  The  Beautiful  is  the  mani- 
festation of  secret  laws  of  Nature,  which,  but  for  this  dis- 
closure, had  been  for  ever  concealed  from  us." 

One  of  Goethe's  letters  to  Schiller  contains  the  following 
reference  to  Diderot: — "Jena,  August  7,  1797.  I  have 
during  these  last  days  been  looking  into  Diderot,  Sur 
la  Peinture,  in  order  to  strengthen  myself  in  the  in- 
spiriting company  of  his  genius.  It  seems  to  me  that 
it  is  the  same  with  Diderot  as  with  many  others  who  hit 
the  truth  with  their  feelings,  but  often  lose  it  again  through 
their  reasoning.  In  his  aesthetic  works,  I  think,  he  still  j 
looks  too  much  to  foreign  and  moral  aims ;  he  does  not  seek ! 
these  sufficiently  in  the  subject  itself  and  in  its  representa- 
tions. To  him  the  beautiful  work  of  Art  must  always  serve 
some  other  purpose.  ...  I  believe  it  to  be  one  of  the 
advantages  of  our  modern  system  of  Philosophy  that  we 
have  a  simple  formula  for  expressing  the  subjective  effect 
of  aesthetic  without  destroying  its  character." 

Goethe's  contributions  to  philosophy  were,  however,  only 
indirect  and  unsystematic.  Those  of  his  great  compeer 
in  poetry  and  criticism,  Schiller  (1759-1805),  were  more 
direct,  and  have  been  more  fruitful.  In  his  letters  on 
aesthetic  culture,  Briefe  iiber  die  asthetische  Erziehung  des 
Menschen  (1793-95),  he  enriched  the  literature  of  his  country 
with  an  admirable  work.  It  should  be  noted  that  they  were 
written  after  the  political  turmoil  of  the  previous  decade 
(1785-95),  in  a  time  that  was  to  Germany  like  a  great  calm 
after  storm.  Schiller's  letters  are  a  Kantian  development, 
and  rest,  as  he  tells  us  in  the  first  of  them,  on  Kantian 
principles  ;  yet  Schiller  was  not  a  disciple  of  Kant.  He  had 
imbibed  the  spirit  of  the  critical  philosophy,  but  he  had  come 


62  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

under  the  influence  of  Leibnitz  and  Rousseau,  before  he  was 
influenced  by  Kant.  He  dissented  on  some  points  both  from 
the  experience  and  the  a  priori  philosophy,  from  the  doctrine 
that  all  our  knowledge  has  its  origin  in  sensation,  and  from 
the  doctrine  that  we  objectify  our  own  understanding  in  the 
interpretation  of  Nature. 

Schiller  held  that  we  reach  the  realm  of  the  objective  by 
a  direct  a  priori  affirmation  or  judgment.  A  phrase  of 
Kant's  was  the  origin  of  his  theory  of  the  "  play-impulse  " 
(Spiel-trieb\  which  is  the  centre  of  his  aesthetic  doctrine.  He 
was  influenced  first  by  Lessing,  next  by  Kant,  and  then  by 
Aristotle  ;  but  Kant  remained  his  chief  master  to  the  end, 
even  when  he  dissented,  and  left  him  behind.  The  saying  of 
Kant's  was  as  follows  : — "  Art,  compared  with  Labour,  may 
be  considered  as  play."  Pondering  this,  Schiller  found 
two  impulses  at  work  within  us — the  first  a  sense-impulse, 

\  the  second  a  form-impulse.     The  former,  which  arises  from 

•  our  physical  nature,  receives  impressions  from  without,  and 
always  seeks  change  ;  the  latter,  arising  out  of  the  activity 

j  of  the  self  or  ego,  acts  from  within,  and  seeks  repose.  The 
two  are  reciprocal,  and  act  reciprocally  ;  but,  when  they 
work  in  harmony,  a  new  impulse  is  generated  out  of  them, 
which  Schiller  called  the  play-impulse.  "  The  object  of  the 
sense-impulse  is  life ;  the  object  of  the  form-impulse  is 
shape  ;  that  of  the  play-impulse  is  living  shape,  which,  in 
its  widest  signification,  is  Beauty."  *  Thus  Beauty  results 
from  the  reciprocity  of  two  opposite  impulses,  and  we  must 
seek  its  highest  ideal  in  the  most  perfect  possible  alliance 

i  of  them.2  The  evolution  of  the  play-impulse  is  not  the 
evolution  of  a  mere  desire  for  pleasure,  or  of  any  desire 
whatsoever.  It  is  the  development  of  aesthetic  appreciation 
in  the  apprehension  of  the  Beautiful. 

The  spiel-trieb,  however,  is  no  explanation  of  the  rise  of 
our  appreciation  of  the  beautiful.  Schiller,  in  his  theory, 
greatly  widens  the  meaning  of  the  word  spiel.  What  he 
aims  at,  and  describes,  is  really  the  harmonious  evolution  or 
development  of  human  nature.  "  That  only  is  play,"  says 
he,  "  which  completes  man,  and  evolves  his  double  nature."3 
1  Briefe  10.  2  Briefe  16.  3  Briefe  15. 


viii  The  Philosophy  of  Germany  63 

On  the  whole,  it  must  be  said  that  Schiller's  aesthetic  letters 
are  very  misty-margined  indeed.  Although  his  notion  of 
the  play-impulse  has  given  rise  to  some  subsequent,  and 
quite  recent,  speculation  in  England,  the  outcome  of  his 
nebulous  theory,  in  his  own  poems,  is  far  better  than  the 
theory  itself.  In  Der  Pilgrim^  for  example,  a  search  for 
the  Beautiful  is  made,  and  it  is  found,  not  in  the  phenomenal 
world,  the  world  of  the  concrete,  but  beyond  it.  Das  Ideal 
und  das  Leben  carries  us  from  the  actual  to  the  transcend- 
ental. Das  Mddchen  und  der  Freund  and  Der  spielende 
Knabe  are  also  similarly  significant.  Schiller's  poetry 
resembled  that  of  Wordsworth,  in  its  finding  within  material 
things  the  symbols  of  the  spiritual. 

Jean  Paul  Richter  wrote  an  introduction  to  Esthetics, 
Vorschule  der  Aesthetik,  which  has  no  speculative  value.  His 
services  to  his  country  were  literary,  rather  than  philosophical. 

In  1794,  Friedrich  von  Schlegel (1772- 1829),  the  youngest 
of  five  brothers  who  were  all  illustrious,  published  a  work 
on  the  Limits  of  the  Beautiful.  He  was  influenced  by  Fichte 
and  Jacobi  against  the  Kantian  position,  but  he  broke  away 
from  them  in  an  almost  erratic  individualism.  The  spiel-trieb 
of  Schiller  seems  to  have  charmed  him,  and  in  it,  and  in 
giving  free  play  to  instinctive  tendency,  he  found  the  way  out 
of  the  fetters  of  dualism.  In  his  book  on  the  Limits  of  the 
Beautiful  he  laments  that  Beauty  is  presented  to  us  in  frag- 
ment ;  and  then  tries  to  unfold  its  elements  in  Nature,  in 
Love,  and  in  Art,  so  as  to  show  that  it  is  in  the  union  of 
the  three  that  the  highest  Beauty  resides.  The  Beautiful 
cannot,  he  thinks,  be  considered  as  distinct  from  the  True, 
or  from  the  fulness  of  life,  the  exhaustless  fund  of  life,  that 
is  ever  developing  itself  in  Nature  ;  nor  can  it  be  severed 
from  the  good,  or  detached  from  her.  The  most  character- 
istic feature  of  Nature  is  its  perennial  vitality,  its  ever-flowing 
exuberance  of  life  ;  while  the  fundamental  features  of  Art 
are  unity,  harmony,  and  symmetry.  To  define  Art  as  the/ 
mere  imitation  of  Nature,  strikes  at  its  very  root ;  and  as' 
Nature  is  inexhaustible,  Art  is  illimitable.  With  all  its  sug- 
gestiveness,  however,  Schlegel's  discussion  is  too  rhetorical, 
and  ends  in  rhapsody. 


64  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

Wilhelm  von  Humboldt  (1767-1835)  held  in  the  main 
to  the  Kantian  doctrine,  but  he  applied  the  critical  philo- 
sophy popularly.  In  1825  he  founded  the  Union  of  the 
Friends  of  Art  in  Prussia,  and  he  wrote  an  annual  report 
for  it.  He  was  rather  averse  to  abstract  thinking,  and 
avowed  his  aim  to  be  the  attainment  of  a  "  harmonious 
wholeness  "  (totalitat).  In  1795  ne  published  two  essays  in 
Schiller's  Horen — (i)  on  the  influence  of  a  difference  of 
sex  in  organic  nature,  and  (2)  on  the  male  and  female 
forms.  In  1798  he  wrote  his  Aesthetische  Versuche.  His 
opinions  on  the  Beautiful,  however,  are  to  be  gathered 
chiefly  from  his  essay  on  Goethe's  Hermann  und  Dorothea, 
from  his  yearly  reports  to  the  Society  of  the  Friends  of  Art, 
and  from  the  prefatory  essay  to  his  correspondence  with 
Schiller  in  1830.  Humboldt  starts  from  two  tendencies  in 
man — the  first  to  "totality,"  the  second  the  tendency  to 
refer  everything  to  the  thinking  subject ;  but  he  held  that 
aesthetic  character  is  formed  in  us  by  a  knowledge  of  the 
great  works  of  Art,  while  Art  itself  is  "  the  faculty  of  making 
Imagination  productive,  according  to  law."  The  artist's 
function  is  to  keep  imagination  alive  and  active  within  us. 
"Man  belongs  to  a  better  world  than  that  of  reality,  viz. 
the  realm  of  ideas."  The  ideas  set  forth  by  the  artist 
lead  man  into  his  own  world,  that  which  is  his  by  right. 
Descending  into  the  realm  of  actuality,  we  are  led  away 
from  ourselves.  He  discusses  the  ideal  of  beauty,  and  then 
proceeds  to  his  theory  of  the  Arts,  dealing  (i)  with  their 
relations  to  each  other,  (2)  with  their  differences.  They  all 
meet  at  a  focus.  "  He  who  would  receive  Art  into  himself 
with  all  his  senses,  must  place  himself  in  the  middle  of 
them  all ;  must  regard  the  work  of  the  painter  poetically, 
and  that  of  the  poet  with  the  eye  of  a  painter." 

Friedrich  Bouterwek  (1766-1828),  a  disciple  of  Kant, 
who  allied  to  his  teaching  ideas  gathered  from  Jacobi,  wrote 
an  ^Esthetic  in  1806,  and  a  Metaphysics  of  the  Beautiful  in 
1 807.  There  is  not  much  of  permanent  value  in  either  work. 
A  later  writer,  Friedrich  Calker,  tried,  in  a  Theory  of  the 
original  Law  of  the  True,  Good,  and  Beautiful,  to  combine 
the  teaching  of  Kant  and  Jacobi  still  further ;  while  another 


vin  The  Philosophy  of  Germany          t       65 

of  the  minor  Kantians,  Bernhard  Bolzano  of  Prague  (1781- 
1848),  wrote  a  treatise  on  The  Idea  of  the  Beautiful  in  1843, 
and  one  on  The  Division  of  the  Fine  Arts  in  1847.  These 
works,  however,  have  no  special  value. 


4.  Schelling  to  Schleiermacher 

The  German  philosopher,  after  Kant,    whose    name  is 
specially  associated  with  the   discussion  of  the    Beautiful, 
is    Schelling.      We  have  already   seen  how   Schiller  broke 
with   the   Kantian  subjectivity,  but  Schelling  did    so  in  a 
more  philosophical  manner  ;  and  perhaps  the  influence  of 
no  writer  in  German  philosophy  has  been  equal  to  that  of 
Schelling  in  throwing  emphasis  on  the  Beautiful  as  a  distinct 
source,  or  sphere  of  knowledge.      Like  Kant's,  Schelling's 
'  philosophy  was  tripartite  ;  dealing  successively  with  the  in- 
tellectual, the  moral,  and  the  aesthetic  consciousness.      The 
centre-point  of  his  whole   philosophy  was   the   identity  of 
subject  and  object,  of  self  and  the  world,  which  are  unified 
in  the  Absolute.      The  unconscious  products  of  Nature  re- 
semble the  conscious  ones  of  man.      It  is  mind,  not  blind 
mechanism,  that  we  see  in  Nature,  and  the  products  of  art 
resemble  those  of  unconscious  Nature.      But  it  is  only  in 
works  of  Art  that  human  intelligence  finds  the  contradictions 
between  itself  and  the  world   removed,  and  mysteries  re- 
solved.    The  chasm  between  self  and  not  self,  between  man 
and  nature,  between  the  conscious  and  the  unconscious,  is 
done  away  with  by  Art,  which  bridges  the  gulf,  and  conducts 
us  from  the  vestibule  of  knowledge,  as  it  were,  to  the  shrine. 
The  Absolute   reveals  itself  to  the    artist  in    his   creative^ 
moods,  and  thus  his  Art — which   to   him   is   higher  than 
Philosophy — is  a  sort  of  rending  of  the  veil  of  Nature,  or  the 
opening  of  a  door  into  her  secrets.     It  is  by  aesthetic  insight 
that  we  reach  the  transcendental,  as  an  objective  reality. 

Schelling's  philosophy  has  both  obscurities  and  incon- 
sistencies, and  it  underwent  considerable  development  as  his 
life  advanced  ;  while  in  the  application  of  his  philosophy  to 
the  arts  he  was  not  successful.  He  had,  however,  a  much 

F 


66  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

wider  and  deeper  knowledge  of  Art  than  his  philosophical 
contemporaries,  and  than  his  great  predecessors  Kant  and 
Fichte.  He  drew  some  philosophic  inspiration  from  Kant, 
but  his  aesthetic  insight  came  to  him  in  part  from  Schiller, 
and  still  more  from  Winckelmann,  "the  unsurpassed  and 
unsurpassable,"  and  from  the  brothers  Schlegel.  Perhaps  the 
most  noteworthy  thing  in  his  Aesthetik  (written  in  1802)  is 
its  reaction  from  the  subjective  position  to  which  Fichte  had 
logically  brought  the  doctrine  of  Kant.  So  far  as  his  teaching 
united  or  bridged  over  the  chasm  between  the  object  and  the 
subject,  the  real  and  the  ideal,  it  did  good  service  ;  and  this 
was  a  service  still  further  carried  out  by  Solger  (who,  how- 
ever, fell  back  almost  to  the  position  of  Plato).  Each  living 
unit,  in  developing  its  life,  carried  out  the  type  of  the 
species  to  which  it  belonged.  The  type  was  the  standard  ; 
but  every  individual,  diverging  somewhat  from  it,  mediated 
between  the  essence,  which  underlay  its  deviation,  and  all 
the  other  individuals  which  also  departed  from  it  in  various 
ways.  Schelling's  was  a  really  comprehensive  attempt  to 
unite  the  Aristotelian  with  the  Platonic  view  of  the  world. 

The  fourteenth  lecture,  in  his  Method  of  University 
Studies  (Methode  des  akademischen  Studiums,  1803),  is  on 
"  The  Science  of  the  Fine  Arts."  In  it  he  teaches  that  Art 
is  not  a  mere  minister  to  the  pleasures  of  sense,  however 
refined.  It  is  to  the  philosopher  a  mirror  of  what  is  divine, 
disclosing  the  absolute  Beauty  through  a  relative  medium. 
Art  is  related  to  Philosophy  as  the  real  is  to  the  ideal ; 
they  are  type  and  antitype.  According  to  Schelling,  the 
philosopher  sees  more  in  Art  than  the  mere  artist  can,  and 
the  essential  nature  of  Art  cannot  be  known  excepting 
through  Philosophy.  He  held  that  the  philosopher,  and  he 
alone,  was  able  "  to  follow  Art  to  its  secret  and  primitive 
source,  to  the  first  workshops  of  its  creation."  And  so,  the 
genius  of  Art  is  self-derived.  It  is  no  slave  to  precedent, 
it  originates  new  ideals  ;  and  it  sets  authority  aside,  not 
because  it  is  lawless,  but  because  it  is  its  own  authority. 
Schelling  goes  on  to  ask,  is  the  philosopher  equally  com- 
petent to  deal  with  the  relative,  the  historical,  and  the 
technical  side  of  Art  ?  He  may  be  able  to  rise  to  the 


viii  TJie  Philosophy  of  Germany  67 

Absolute  by  the  help  of  the  relative ;  but  can  he  afterwards 
discern  it,  illumining  the  relative  ?  Schelling  replies  that 
if  we  get  to  a  unity  underlying  the  different  phases  which  Art 
has  historically  assumed,  this  unity  will  abolish  the  antithesis 
between  them.  That  which  is  common  to  all,  cancelling  the 
difference  of  the  successive  periods,  will  at  the  same  time 
show  how  each  particular  form  arose.  It  will  at  once 
transcend,  and  comprehend  or  explain  them. 

A  disciple  of  Schelling,  Georg  A.  F.  Ast  (1778-1841), 
wrote  a  Handbook  of  ^Esthetics  in  1805,  but  it  has  no 
special  philosophical  significance. 

One  of  the  prominent  names  in  German  literature  should 
be  mentioned  at  this  stage,  viz.  Ludwig  Tieck  (1773-1853), 
a  romance-writer  and  poet  of  considerable  fame.  As  one 
of  the  young  enthusiasts  who  gathered  round  the  brothers 
Schlegel,  at  Jena,  he  showed  more  originality  than  any  of 
them.  In  1799  he  wrote  :  "  It  is  a  noble  aim  to  create  a 
work  of  art  that  transcends  the  utilities  of  life,  a  work  of 
beauty  which  shines  with  its  own  splendour,  and  complete 
in  itself.  The  instinct  to  produce  such  a  work  more  directly 
points  to  a  higher  world  than  any  other  instinct  of  our 
nature."  He  defined  Beauty  as  "a  unique  ray  out  of  the 
celestial  brightness  "  ;  but  he  added,  "  in  passing  through 
the  prism  of  the  imagination  of  the  people  of  different 
zones,  it  decomposes  itself  into  a  thousand  colours,  a 
thousand  different  degrees." 

In  Johann  Friedrich  Herbart  (1776-1841)  we  find  the 
pioneer  of  a  new  realism.  It  was  a  reaction  from  the 
idealism  of  Fichte  (whose  pupil  he  had  been)  and  the 
absolutism  of  Schelling  •  and  into  his  own  realism  he 
interwove  elements  derived  from  Plato  and  from  Leibnitz. 
Herbart  held  the  Chair  of  Philosophy  at  Konigsberg 
(Kant's  Chair)  from  1809  to  1833.  The  function  of 
Philosophy,  as  unfolded  by  him,  is  "the  elaboration  of 
concepts."  It  lies  behind,  and  yet  is  contained  in,  all  the 
sciences.  Logic  is  that  part  of  Philosophy  which  dis- 
tinguishes and  co-ordinates  our  concepts,  making  them 
clear.  But  our  concepts  have  also  to  be  corrected  and 
transformed,  with  a  view  to  the  removal  of  contradictions  ; 


68  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

this  is  the  work  of  Metaphysics.  Other  concepts  do  not 
call  for  revision  or  correction,  but  simply  for  reduction  to 
principles  ;  this  is  the  domain  of  Esthetic.  Thus  while 
Metaphysic  doubles  back  upon  our  original  ideas,  so  as  to 
make  them  vindicate  themselves,  and  bring  them  into 
harmony  with  the  world  and  with  one  another,  ./Esthetic 
simply  asserts  or  affirms — our  judgments  as  to  Beauty  being 
involuntary  ones.  Herbart  deals  almost  exclusively  with  the 
elemental  and  abstract  intellectual  relations  of  the  Beautiful. 
He  did  not  see  the  equal  importance  of  sentiment  or  feeling. 

Two  of  Herbart's  disciples  may  be  mentioned  at  this 
stage,  although  somewhat  out  of  their  chronological  place. 
Adolf  Zeising,  in  his  Aesthetische  Forschungen  (1855), 
develops  Herbart's  teaching  as  to  the  elemental  relations 
of  the  Beautiful,  although  he  does  not  directly  borrow 
from  him.  The  golden  section  of  a  line  is  that  which  cuts 
it  so  that  the  smaller  section  is  to  the  larger  as  the  larger 
is  to  the  whole.  It  is  thus  that  Ueberweg  characterises 
Zeising.  He  "finds  in  the  so-called  'golden  section5  the 
division  of  a  line  ( =  i )  into  two  such  parts  (a  and  b) 
that  a  :  b  :  :  b  :  I,  an  aesthetic  significance,  in  that  it  fur- 
nishes the  most  perfect  means  between  absolute  equality 
and  absolute  diversity,  or  between  expressionless  symmetry 
and  proportionless  expression,  or  between  rigid  regularity 
and  unregulated  freedom."  Robert  Zimmermann,  Professor 
of  Philosophy  in  the  University  of  Prag,  also  followed 
Herbart,  and  endorsed  his  fundamental  conception.  He 
wrote  an  elaborate  Geschichte  der  Aesthetik  als  philosoph- 
ischer  Wissenschaft  (1858).  Two  volumes  of  an  Aesthetik 
followed  in  1865,  and  Studien  und  Kiitiken  zur  Philosophic 
und  Aesthetik  in  1870.  Zimmermann's  history  is,  however, 
better  than  his  system.  It  is  a  really  comprehensive  sur- 
vey of  the  course  of  philosophical  thought  on  the  subject 
from  Plato  to  Lotze  ;  and  discusses  the  Neoplatonists,  the 
Dutch,  French,  and  English  theories  of  Beauty,  as  well 
as  those  of  Germany.  Some  of  his  successors  confine 
themselves  exclusively  to  their  own  countrymen. 

In  the  posthumous  Lectures  on  ^Esthetics  (Vorlesungen 
tiber  Aesthetik),  by  Professor  U.  W.  F.  Solger  of  Berlin 


vin  The  Philosophy  of  Germany  69 

(1780-1819),  we  find  the  philosophy  of  Herbart  developed 
along  a  special  line.  Solger  had  been  a  disciple  of 
Schelling,  and  he  was  influenced  by  the  Schlegels.  His 
Erwin  is  a  Platonic  dialogue,  somewhat  heavy  in  con- 
struction, wanting  all  the  grace  and  naivete  of  the  Greek. 
There  are  four  interlocutors — Anselm,  who  takes  up  the 
position  of  Schelling  ;  Bernhard,  who  is  Fichtean  ;  Adel- 
bert,  who  is  Solger  himself;  and  Erwin,  a  youth  as  yet 
unattached  to  any  school.  The  first  two  dialogues  are 
metaphysical,  on  the  nature  of  Beauty  ;  the  last  two  are  on 
the  nature  of  Art.  Beauty  is  represented  as  an  immediate 
revelation  of  God.  "  Only  then  is  beauty  discerned,  when 
we  see  in  it  the  living  moving  spirit  of  the  all-compassing 
Deity."  In  keeping  with  this  theosophic  view  of  the 
Beautiful,  Solger  teaches  that  in  the  beauty  of  the  body  the 
soul  appears.  It  is  not,  however,  by  any  one  special  organ  ] 
that  we  apprehend  the  Beautiful.  It  is  by  an  intuitive 
gaze  of  the  whole  nature  that  the  realm  of  pure  being  is 
entered,  and  one  of  the  characteristics  of  pure  being  thus 
discovered  is  its  beauty.  In  reference  to  Art,  he  affirms 
that  it  is  all  symbolical,  ancient  Art  dealing  for  the  most 
part  with  objective  symbols,  and  modern  Art  with  subjective 
ones.  As  a  revelation  of  the  divine  Idea,  he  held  that 
Beauty  is  on  one  side  essence,  and  on  the  other  appearance  ; 
and  the  arts  of  poetry  and  music  disclose  the  former  more 
perfectly,  those  of  painting,  architecture,  etc.,  realise  the 
latter.  Solger  emphasises  the  fact  that  every  apocalypse  of 
the  Beautiful  is  of  necessity  evanescent ;  but  his  teaching 
is  full  of  crotchets,  e.g.  the  doctrine  that  the  beautiful  is 
doomed  to  extinction,  because  the  ideal  always  transcends 
the  actual,  and  that  the  essence  of  all  true  art  is  irony,  "  the 
self-destruction  of  the  idea  brought  about  by  the  appearance 
of  prototypal  beauty." 

Karl  C.  F.  Krause  (1781-1832),  an  absolutist  who 
started  from  the  position  of  Spinoza  and  Schelling,  modi- 
fied their  doctrine,  both  in  its  metaphysical  and  ethical 
aspects,  and  added  some  ideas  derived  from  Kant  and 
Fichte.  The  foundation  science  may  be  indifferently  named 
ontology,  theology,  cosmology.  It  deals  with  the  absolute 


yo  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

and  the  essential.  After  it  come  Mathematics,  Logic, 
^Esthetics,  Ethics.  Esthetics  is  a  formal  science,  because 
Beauty  is  an  essential  characteristic  of  the  Infinite  and 
Absolute  ;  and  as  realised  in  Art,  it  is  the  harmony  of  the 
manifold  in  the  one.  Its  highest  characteristic  is  self- 
sufficiency,  and  this  marks  it  off  from  the  useful  and  also 
from  the  symbolical.  Krause  differs  here  from  Solger. 
A  thing  "  is  beautiful  for  what  it  is,  not  for  what  it  symbol- 
ises." In  the  ascending  stages  of  organic  perfection  in 
Nature  we  find  a  scale  of  natural  beauty,  which  ends  in  the 
"beauty  of  God,"  in  whom  all  things  are  united.  To  us 
the  Beautiful  is  that  which  actively  engages  and  satisfies 
our  reason,  understanding,  and  fancy,  according  to  law, 
and  which  fills  the  mind  with  disinterested  complacency. 
Kant's,  Schiller's,  and  Solger's  definitions  are  variously 
combined  by  Krause. 

Another  of  the  modern  German  Platonists,  who  caught 
the  inspiration  of  Schelling,  must  be  mentioned  at  this  stage  ; 
although  he  was  more  distinctively  an  ethical  writer, 
Schleiermacher  (1768-1834).  According  to  Schleiermacher, 
we  know  the  Absolute,  not  by  thought,  but  by  feeling. 
Religious  feeling  is  the  highest  channel  of  human  know- 
ledge ;  and  while  Art  was  to  him  the  language  of  religion, 
it  may  be  said  that  his  ethics  were  aesthetic.  Instead  of 
beginning  with  the  individual  arts,  he  starts  with  the  notion 
of  Beauty,  and  defines  aesthetics  as  "the  science  of  the 
Beautiful  in  Art."  In  his  description  of  the  several  arts 
seriatim  there  are  some  shrewd  comments  but  no  "  open 
vision."  He  was  more  of  an  enthusiast  than  an  expert. 


5.  Hegel  to  Carriere 

We  now  reach  a  greater  than  Schelling  and  his  disciples, 
and  the  third  illustrious  name  in  German  philosophy  from 
Kant,  viz.  Hegel.  Hegel's  philosophy,  like  that  of  his  two 
great  predecessors,  falls  into  three  sections — the  first  deal- 
ing with  what  he  deemed  the  logical  evolution  and  develop- 
ment of  the  Absolute,  as  pure  thought  (the  philosophy  of 


viii  The  PJiilosophy  of  Germany  71 

Mind) ;  the  second,  with  the  evolution  and  development  of 
thought  in  the  external  world  (the  philosophy  of  Nature)  ; 
and  the  third,  with  the  return  of  thought  from  this 
objectivity  to  itself  (the  philosophy  of  Spirit). 

Hegel  wrote  a  very  elaborate  treatise  on  Aesthetik,  per- 
haps the  most  elaborate  in  German  philosophical  literature. 
It  is  divided  into  three  sections.  The  first  discusses  the 
philosophy  of  the  Beautiful,  both  in  the  abstract  and  in  the 
concrete,  the  Ideal  in  Art  and  its  realisation  ;  the  second 
deals  with  the  development  of  the  art-impulse  in  its  various 
types,  symbolic,  classic,  romantic ;  while  the  third  treats  of 
the  several  Arts  in  detail. 

Beauty,  according  to  Hegel,  is  the  disclosure  of  mind, 
or  of  the  idea,  through  sensuous  forms  or  media ;  and  as 
Mind  is  higher  than  Nature,  by  so  much  is  the  beauty  of  Art 
higher  than  the  beauty  of  Nature.  Natural  beauty  is  but  the 
reflection  of  beauty  of  mind.  It  appeals  to  all  the  powers, 
to  the  senses,  to  feeling,  to  perception,  and  to  imagination  ; . 
and  "its  forms  are  as  manifold  as  its  phenomena  are 
omnipresent."  We  may  generalise  the  forms  which  Beauty 
assumes,  and  we  find  that  in  all  cases  it  is  "the  unity  of 
the  manifold "  ;  but  while  it  is  to  be  found  in  all  Nature, 
and  especially  in  vital  Nature  (organised  living  structures), 
it  is  most  perfectly  disclosed  to  us  in  and  through  Art.  | 
The  art -products  of  the  world  register  the  insight  of 
the  human  race  into  Beauty,  and  the  nations  of  the  world 
have  left  their  profoundest  intuitions  and  ideas  thus  em- 
bodied. Art  gives  to  phenomenal  appearances  "a  reality 
that  is  born  of  mind  "  ;  and  through  Art  they  become,  not 
semblances,  but  higher  realities.  It  is  thus  that  Art  breaks, 
as  it  were,  through  the  shell,  and  gets  out  the  kernel  for  us. 
It  comes  to  this,  that  the  great  plastic  power  which 
works  in  Nature  has  evolved  certain  definite  types,  which 
(on  the  last  analysis)  are  thoughts,  notions,  ideas,  mind- 
forms,  disclosing  the  mind's  essence.  And  these  are  not 
merely  a  series  of  detached  existences,  but  all  that  has 
been  evolved  has  a  certain  fitness  of  relation  and  definite- 
ness  of  proportion.  In  this  fitness  and  proportion  there 
is  Beauty.  At  the  best,  however,  it  is  a  lifeless  type 


72  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

of  Beauty.  It  is  only  when  life  animates  a  perfectly 
developed  form,  that  Beauty  discloses  itself  to  the  full. 
Life,  in  the  first  instance,  shapes  the  forms  of  Nature, 
moulding  and  evolving  them.  But  they  are  not  the  life 
itself.  It — the  formative,  shaping  power — moves  on,  in 
manifold  development,  to  animate  other  forms  ;  and  it  is 
in  this  evolving  and  protean  life  that  the  highest  Beauty 
resides.  Beauty  is  thus  the  Absolute  realising  itself  in  the 
relative.  It  is  the  Absolute  passing  out  of  latency  into  self- 
manifestation  and  self-realisation  ;  and  in  this  process  the 
lustre  of  the  idea,  breaking  through  the  barrier  of  the 
material,  illumines  it.  This  is  Beauty. 

In  every  work  of  Art  possessing  Beauty,  we  must  dis- 
tinguish the  external  form  from  that  which  lies  beneath  it, 
viz.  the  inner  spirit  by  which  a  soul  is  breathed  into  the 
body  of  the  work.  A  work  of  art  is  not  made  up  of,  or 
exhausted  in,  a  series  of  lines,  curves,  surface-forms,  colours, 
sounds.  It  is  nothing  if  it  does  not  disclose  feeling  and 
thought  (mind). 

Hegel  criticises  Plato's  idealism,  and  finds  it  too  abstract, 
and  empty  of  content.  The  aim  of  his  own  philosophy  was 
to  reconcile  the  extremes  of  the  universal  and  the  particular. 
He  wished  to  get  hold  of  some  fertile  principle,  which  was 
able  to  do  this,  by  showing  how  the  particulars  were 
contained  within  the  universal,  and  how  a  universal  was 
illustrated  by  the  particulars.  To  this  end  he  held  that  the 
artist  had  to  impress  the  seal  of  his  individual  being  upon 
external  things,  and  to  find  represented  in  them  what  was 
most  characteristic  of  himself.  Hence,  though  a  work  of 
Art  addresses  itself  first  of  all  to  sensuous  apprehension 
(to  sight  and  sound),  it  soon  liberates  itself  from  these 
trammels,  and  the  whole  region  of  sense  is  seen  to  be  a 
sort  of  shadow-world.  Art  is  no  mere  imitation  or  mirroring 
of  nature.  It  is  a  transcendence  of  Nature,  i.e.  of  the 
actual.  Every  great  artistic  work  must  have  Nature  for  its 
basis  and  its  starting-point ;  but,  in  proportion  to  its  great- 
ness, it  rises  from  this  foundation.  It  lives  and  moves,  as 
it  were  amphibiously,  in  the  two  worlds  of  the  actual  and 
the  ideal. 


vin  The  Philosophy  of  Germany  73 

Hegel  has  many  profound  remarks  on  the  different  > 
types  of  Art — the  symbolical,  classical,  and  romantic — and 
their  historical  succession  and  development.  At  first,  and 
specially  in  Egypt,  the  land  of  symbol,  thought  was  sug- 
gested, not  expressed.  Next  in  Greece,  it  found  expression 
in  the  fulness  of  finite  form  ;  and  as  man  rose  in  intelligence, 
his  gods  became  more  human.  Next,  when  the  higher 
spirit  broke  through  the  trammels  of  material  form,  the 
anthropomorphism  of  classical  art  gave  place  to  the  new 
ideal  which  we  find  in  romantic  art.  Thus  the  stages  in 
the  development  of  mind  are  mirrored  for  us  in  the  historic 
evolution  of  Art. 

In  his  classification  of  the  separate  Arts,  Hegel  rises 
from  the  groundwork  of  the  natural  toward  the  spiritual, 
and  arranges  them  on  somewhat  parallel  lines  to  the  sym- 
bolic, classical,  and  romantic  series,  (i)  Architecture,  in 
which  the  sensuous  element  (the  material)  is  necessarily 
present  in  excess,  and  in  which  symbol  dominates.  (2) 
Sculpture,  in  which  the  material  is  less  forcibly  present,  as 
sculpture  is  a  representation  of  life,  a  step  towards  ideality — 
an  art  which  attained  its  zenith  in  the  classical  period. 
(3)  Painting,  an  art  which  deals  with  and  represents  Life, 
both  in  form  and  in  colour.  In  this  we  reach  the  romantic 
sphere,  which  is  still  further  attained  (4)  in  Music,  an  art 
which  dispenses  with  the  material  more  than  painting  does, 
and  is  the  most  subjective  of  the  arts  ;  and  (5)  in  Poetry, 
the  most  universal  and  spiritual  of  them  all.  Music  appeals 
more  to  the  emotions,  and  Poetry  more  to  the  intellect. 
The  medium  of  the  latter  is  not  sound,  but  speech,  and 
speech  as  the  vehicle  of  ideas. 

In  his  attempts,  however,  to  find  a  historical  evolution 
of  aesthetic  ideas  running  parallel  to  his  three  forms  of  the 
Symbolic,  the  Classical,  and  the  Romantic,  it  must  be 
confessed  that  Hegel  often  reads  into  history  a  meaning  of 
his  own.  We  find  romantic  elements  both  in  the  classical 
and  the  symbolic  periods  ;  and  we  find  symbolic  ideas  in  the 
special  eras  of  classicalism  and  of  romance.  Perhaps  the 
supreme  value  of  Hegel's  Aesthetik — which  is  one  of  his 
greatest  works — is  not  the  residuum  of  propositions,  or  data 


74  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

which  he  has  proved,  but  the  extraordinary  wealth  of  his 
critical  insight  into  the  several  Arts,  and  their  various 
problems. 

Of  all  the  disciples  of  Hegel  no  one  developed  his  aesthetic 
teaching  so  well  as  F.  Theodor  Vischer  (1807-1887).  He 
made  the  discovery  of  a  doctrine  of  the  Beautiful  almost 
the  sole  labour  of  his  life.  A  short  study,  Ueber  das 
Erhabene  und  Komische  (the  sublime  and  the  humorous), 
J837,  was  followed  by  his  great  book,  Aesthetik  oder 
Wissenschaft  des  Schonen  (1846-51),  and  by  several 
later  works.  He  both  elaborated  Hegel's  doctrine,  and 
evolved  it  in  many  directions.  The  one  disfigurement  of 
his  Aesthetik  is  his  assumption  that  only  a  pantheistic 
theory  of  the  universe  can  do  full  justice  to  the  Beautiful. 
He  too  frequently  tries  to  break  a  lance  with  the  theistic 

*  interpretation  of  the  world.  The  artist,  according  to 
Vischer,  does  not  find  the  Beautiful  by  any  imitation  of  the 
actual.  He  does  not  indulge  in  the  mere  copy-work  of 
the  photographer,  nor  does  he  find  it  by  imaginatively 
breaking  with  Nature,  for  that  would  only  yield  the  fantastic. 
He  does  something  very  different.  He  pierces  to  the  core 
of  Nature.  He  finds  its  secret  by  getting  to  its  centre,  and 
apprehending  its  ideal.  In  all  objects  that  seem  to  be 
beautiful,  there  is  an  actual  form  which  approximates  to  the 
ideal ;  but  Vischer  thus  distinguishes  the  normal  from  the 
abnormal  in  Nature.  The  normal  is  that  which  conforms  to 
law,  and  therefore  to  the  type  in  Nature  ;  the  abnormal  is 
that  which  departs  from  law,  and  therefore  from  the  type. 

I  But  if  all  the  actual  forms  in  Nature  corresponded  to  the 
type,  there  would  be  monotony,  and  therefore  ugliness.  It 
is  through  partial,  though  very  slight,  departures  from  the 
type  in  each  individual,  along  with  a  mirroring  of  the  type 
by  those  very  departures,  that  the  Beautiful  is  known — in 
other  words,  by  a  retention  of  the  typical  form  by  all,  while 
at  the  same  time  each  individual  renounces  it  in  part. 

Vischer  tried — even  more  than  Schelling,  or  his  imme- 
diate master  Hegel — to  unite  the  Platonic  and  the  Aristo- 
telian view  of  things,  the  ideal  and  the  real.  It  is  when 
the  two  are  conjoined,  then  and  then  only,  according  to 


viii  The  Philosophy  of  Germany  75 

Vischer,  that  we  have  Beauty.  The  absolute  Beauty,  of 
which  the  Platonists  tell  us,  existed  ab  initio ;  but  it  has 
mirrored  itself  to  us  in  two  streams  of  phenomena.  It  has 
disclosed  itself  in  external  Nature,  and  in  the  mind  of  man. 
When  the  germs  of  Beauty  fructify  in  any  individual,  he 
immediately  discerns,  by  contact  with  it,  the  beauty  of  the 
external  world  ;  and  thereafter  the  mind  ascends  (that  is  to 
say,  it  may  or  can  ascend)  to  the  primal  source  of  Beauty 
in  the  archetypal  world.  No  individual  mind  can  ascend 
to  it,  or  grasp  it  directly  —  at  first  hand,  as  it  were. 
Each  individual  must  begin  with  the  actual  Beauty  that 
is  mirrored  in  individual  things.  Afterwards  it  can  rise 
to  the  Source,  and  it  is  impelled  to  do  so  by  the  imperfec- 
tion which  mingles  with  all  the  actual  forms  that  manifest 
the  Beautiful  to  it. 

As  individual  objects  that  possess  it  are  beheld  by  us 
one  after  another,  the  successive  experience  heightens  our 
general  sense  of  Beauty.  This  is  not  due,  however,  to  a 
process  of  mere  idealisation  of  the  objects,  but  simply  to 
the  fact  that  surrounding  each  single  thing  (which  is  itself 
imperfectly  beautiful)  there  is  a  sort  of  halo,  which  connects 
it,  in  its  isolation  and  particularity,  with  the  entire  sphere  of 
the  Beautiful.  The  ceaseless  experience  of  imperfection, 
associated  with  what  is  fair,  leads  us  to  detach  the  features 
that  are  imperfect,  and  thus  to  reach,  as  it  were,  the  type 
of  the  class,  separate  from  those  things  that  mar  it.  It 
is  thus  that  we  obtain  a  relative  standard,  or  criterion  of 
the  Beautiful  which  is  higher  than  any  actual  loveliness 
mirrored  to  us  in  outward  things.  As  our  ideal,  however, 
is  always  expanding,  it  is  equally  evident  that  no  final 
standard  can  be  reached  by  us. 

In  the  first  part  of  his  Aesthetik,  Vischer  treats  of  the 
Metaphysics  of  the  Beautiful ;  in  the  second,  of  Beauty  in 
Nature  and  in  the  mind  of  man  ;  and  in  the  third,  of 
Beauty  in  Art.  The  last  is  the  amplest  part  of  the  treatise, 
and  to  it  two  volumes  are  devoted.  Art  in  general  is  first 
discussed,  and  then  the  separate  arts  seriatim.  He  classifies 
the  Arts  very  much  as  Hegel  had  classified  them.  There 
is  (i)  the  objective  class,  which  appeal  to  us  through  the 


7  6  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

eye,  viz.  Architecture,  Sculpture,  and  Painting ;  (2)  the 
subjective,  that  appeal  to  us  through  the  ear,  Music  ;  and 
(3)  that  which  is  both  objective  and  subjective,  viz.  Poetry. 

A  colleague  of  Vischer,  Karl  Kostlin,  published  an 
Aesthetik  at  Tubingen  in  1863-69  which  dealt  chiefly  with 
the  constructive  Arts  and  with  music.  He  discussed  the 
beautiful  in  Nature  more  fully  than  Hegel  had  done. 

Christian  Hermann  Weisse  (1801-1866),  at  first  a 
Hegelian,  gradually  broke  with  his  master's  doctrine  and 
became  an  opponent,  especially  objecting  to  the  rank 
assigned  to  Logic,  and  endeavouring  to  graft  a  mystic 
element  on  the  purely  rational  one  of  Hegel.  In  1830  he 
issued  his  System  der  Aesthetik  als  Wissenschaft  von  der 
Idee  des  Schonen.  In  his  doctrine  of  the  Absolute  Spirit, 
Hegel  virtually  made  formal  logic  the  crown  of  the  edifice 
of  knowledge,  but  subordinated  both  art  and  religion  to 
science.  Weisse  opposes  this.  His  Aesthetik  treats  of  the 
Beautiful  (i)  as  subjective  and  universal,  (2)  as  objective 
and  special  in  the  several  arts,  and  (3)  as  subjective-object- 
ive, existing  in  the  mind  and  character  of  man  ;  whence 
the  transition  is  made  to  religion  and  theology.  In  the 
first  section  he  discusses  the  subject  of  the  ugly  more  fully 
than  it  had  been  dealt  with  before,  connecting  it  with  the 
humorous.  This  was  afterwards  elaborated  by  J.  Karl  F. 
Rosenkrantz  (1805-1879),  the  Konigsberg  Hegelian,  who 
held  Kant's  Chair  after  1833,  and  who  has  been  the  repre- 
sentative of  the  centre  of  that  school,  in  his  aesthetics  of 
the  Ugly  {Aesthetik  des  Hasslichen,  1853).  He  recognises 
Weisse's  merits,  but  objects  to  the  stress  of  the  antithesis 
being  laid  between  the  humorous  and  the  sublime.  The 
Beautiful  is  a  genus  comprehending  under  it  the  agreeable 
and  the  sublime.  The  ugly  is  opposed  to  all  of  them,  while 
the  distasteful  is  opposed  to  the  agreeable,  and  the  ordinary 
to  the  sublime.  The  humorous  can  seize  the  ugly,  and 
transform  it  into  the  pleasing,  by  the  way  it  deals  with  it. 
The  ugly  is  formless,  incorrect,  and  inharmonious. 

E.  Kuno  B.  Fischer  ( 1 824 ),  a  partial  Hegelian,  revert- 
ing to  Plato  and  to  Kant,  who  in  1849  wrote  Diotima,  die 
Idee  des  Schonen,  may  be  regarded  as  a  successor  of 


vin  TJte  Philosophy  of  Germany  77 

Vischer.  In  addition  to  Diolima  he  has  written  aesthetic 
essays  on  various  subjects — on  Schiller,  on  Lessing's 
Nathan  der  Weise,  on  Shakespeare,  on  Faust ',  etc. — but 
has  done  little  to  advance  aesthetic  theory. 

Another    Hegelian,    Moritz    Carriere    (1817 ),   who 

taught  philosophy  both  at  Giessen  and  at  Munich,  and  who 
followed  on  somewhat  similar  intellectual  lines — taking  up 
a  position  resembling  that  of  Weisse  and  K.  Fischer — has 
done  much  more  for  aesthetic.  In  1854  he  wrote  Das 
Wesen  imd  die  Formen  der  Poesie.  His  aim  in  this  book 
was  to  show  that  we  can  only  reach  a  true  theory  of  Art 
when  we  transcend  a  commonplace  Pantheism  and  a 
commonplace  Deism,  in  the  apprehension  of  a  Divine 
Essence,  which  is  everlastingly  revealing  itself  in  Nature 
and  in  History.  In  the  first  part  of  his  Aesthetik  (1859) 
he  treats  (i)  of  the  Idea  of  the  Beautiful,  (2)  of  Beauty 
in  Nature  and  in  the  mind  of  man,  (3)  of  Beauty  in 
Art.  In  the  second  part  he  deals  with  the  Arts  seriatim, 
under  the  heads  of  (i)  Plastic  Art,  (2)  Music,  (3)  Poetry. 
Throughout  his  book  Carriere  not  only  diverges  from,  but 
wages  war  with  the  doctrine  of  Hegel,  and  Hegel's  chief 
disciple  Vischer,  which  was  pantheistic.  Carriere  maintains 
that  the  pantheistic  view  of  the  universe  prevents  an 
intellectual  recognition  of  its  Beauty,  both  in  general  and  in 
detail.  He  held  that  the  special  function  of  Philosophy 
was  to  unite  the  opposite  theories  of  transcendence  and 
immanence,  the  dualistic  and  the  pantheistic.  The  Beauti- 
ful consists  in  a  certain  unity  of  idea,  underlying  the  mani- 
fold individual  and  concrete  forms  of  sense ;  its  unity 
being  evidenced  by  our  very  desire  that  others  should 
agree  with  us  in  our  judgments  regarding  it.  But  to 
evoke  the  sense  of  the  Beautiful  in  us,  we  require  the 
stimulus  of  novelty,  and  with  this  the  return  of  the  mind 
upon  itself,  and  the  perception  of  itself  in  all  it  sees.  In  a 
later  work,  Art  in  connection  with  the  Development  of 
Culture,  and  the  Ideals  of  Humanity,  in  five  elaborate 
volumes,  Carriere  traces  the  whole  philosophy  of  History 
from  the  aesthetic  side.  He  may  be  best  described  as  an 
ideal  realist,  his  chief  aim  being  to  escape  from  dualism, 


78  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

without  landing  in  a  pantheistic  theory.  He  held  that  if  we 
adopt  a  theory  of  immanence,  not  only  the  Beauty  of  Nature 
but  Beauty  in  itself  is  unintelligible.  The  influence  both  of 
Hegel  and  of  Lessing  may  be  traced  in  much  that  Carriere 
has  written  of  the  Arts  and  their  historic  stages,  especially 
of  Poetry. 

6.   Scliopenhaiier  and  Hartmann 

Arthur  Schopenhauer  (1788-1860),  founder  of  the  most 
distinctive  school  of  German  philosophy  since  Hegel,  pub- 
lished in  1819  Die  Welt  als  Wille  und  Vorstellung,  a 
work  which  excited  little  interest  when  it  appeared.  It 
was  a  recoil  from,  and  a  vigorous  criticism  of,  the  post- 
Kantian  schools,  especially  of  Hegel ;  and  it  was  sent  forth 
as,  on  the  one  hand  a  return  to  Kant,  and  on  the  other 
a  legitimate  and  normal  development  of  his  philosophy,  as 
opposed  to  the  illegitimate  developments  of  other  schools. 
Its  two  main  positions  were  (i)  that  the  world  exists  for  us 
only  as  it  subjectively  appears  to  us.  It  is  only  the 
presentation  of  things  that  we  know.  We  do  not  know 
ourselves  (as  subjects)  and  things  beyond  us  (as  objects) 
separately.  The  object  does  not  create  the  subject,  as 
materialism  asserts  ;  nor  does  the  subject  create  the  object, 
as  idealism  affirms.  The  subject  and  the  object  are  known 
together  ;  each  is  necessary  to  the  other,  and  they  imply 
each  other ;  but  we  have  no  knowledge  of  the  essence  of 
either — the  Ding-an-sich — all  that  we  know  is  the  presenta- 
tion (vorstellung).  (2)  This,  however,  is  only  one  half  of 
the  truth,  that  half  which  refers  to  our  Knowledge.  The 
second  half  refers  to  the  second  sphere,  that  of  the  Will, 
which  is  a  conscious  power,  operating  from  within.  It  is 
only  by  it — by  volition,  or  the  universal  will — that  we  reach 
the  realm  of  reality,  the  Ding-an-sich.  The  essence  of 
matter  is  force,  and  all  force  within  the  Universe  is  in 
essence  will. 

Schopenhauer's  philosophy  has  many  aspects,  but  it  is 
only  as  bearing  on  Aesthetik  that  it  concerns  us  here. 
He  holds  that  Will  does  not  show  itself  in  the  Universe  in 


vni  The  Philosophy  of  Germany  79 

fleeting  phenomenal  changes,  but  in  the  enduring  species, 
the  persistent  genera,  which  renew  themselves  after  their 
kind.  "  The  individual  withers,  but  the  race  is  more  and 
more."  The  type  survives,  while  the  individuals  only 
approximate  to  it.  The  generic  will  of  the  Universe,  the 
only  real  Ding-an-sich,  is  an  archetypal  idea,  behind  all 
individua.  In  so  far  as  individuals  approximate  to  it,  they 
are  beautiful ;  and  in  so  far  as  the  artist  seizes  it  by  intuition, 
he  "sees  into  the  life  of  things  "  ;  and,  his  spirit  "into  the 
mighty  vision  passing,"  he  is  transfused  with  the  object  he 
contemplates,  becoming  one  with  it.  Self,  the  narrow  in- 
dividual self,  is  annihilated  ;  but  he  finds  a  larger  self  in 
the  beauty  of  the  cosmos. 

It  is  not  by  sense  perception,  nor  by  the  scientific  under-' 
standing,  nor  by  any  process  of  reasoning,  that  an  object  is  \ 
discerned  to  be  beautiful,  but  by  intuition  ;  and  this  intui- 
tion apprehends  its  object,  not  as  an  isolated  phenomenon, 
an   individuum,  but  as   a  generic,  typical,  or  ideal  thing, 
which  is  not  considered  by  us  as  regards  its  uses,  but  as 
regards  itself,  in  its  own  distinctive  self-sufficingness.      In 
our  intuition  of  the  Beautiful  the  energy  of  the  will  is  at  rest,  . 
desire  ceases,  the  mind  regards  the  object  disinterestedly,  ' 
out  of  all  relation  to  the  wish  to  possess  ;  and  it  is  thus 
that  we  reach  the  sphere  of  the  beautiful  as  the  sphere  of 
the  permanent.     It  is  through  a  kind  of  ecstasy,  which  from 
the  very  first  annihilates  self,  that  the  artist  attains  his  best  , 
result  ;  the  narrowness  of  his  individual  being  is  outstepped. 
Thus,  in  order  to  any  great  artistic  result,  the  will  must  be 
detached    from    the    intellect.       Personal    desire    must    be 
crushed  under  the  energy  of  the  impersonal  reason.     The 
obtrusion  of  his  own  personality  mars  the  work  of  the  artist. 
"  A  work  of  genius  is  not  a  thing  of  utility.     To  be  useless 
is  its  very  patent  of  nobility.      It  exists  for  itself  alone." 

Schopenhauer  has  also  dealt  with  the  subject  in  others 
of  his  works,  in  his  Metaphysik  des  Schonen  und  Aesthetik^ 
etc.,  but  all  the  essential  points  of  his  teaching  are  given  in 
Die  Welt  ah  Wille  und  Vorstellung. 

None  of  the  recent  German  writers  on  Aesthetik  has 
discussed  the  subject  more  brightly  or  suggestively  than 


8o  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

Eduard  von  Hartmann.  In  1868,  in  his  twenty-seventh 
year,  he  published  his  Philosophic  des  Unbewussten.  Hart- 
mann's  system  is  briefly  an  attempt  to  bring  the  Hegelian 
logic  (or  doctrine  of  "the  idea")  and  Schopenhauer's  doc- 
trine of  "  will  "  into  harmony,  as  co-ordinate  functions  of  a 
single  (but  unconscious)  world-essence — an  ultimate  cosmic 
principle,  like  that  of  the  Eleatics,  or  Erigena,  or  Spinoza. 
He  thinks  that  his  doctrine  of  The  Unconscious,  and  its 
development  as  a  cosmic  principle,  casts  light  on  all  other 
problems,  psychological,  physiological,  ethical,  religious,  and 
aesthetic. 

In  the  second  section  of  his  book  there  is  a  chapter 
(the  fifth)  on  "  The  Unconscious  in  aesthetic  judgment, 
and  in  artistic  production."  In  it  he  refers  to  the  two 
historical  schools,  which  have  given  rise  to  opposite  tend- 
encies— the  first  (dating  from  Plato),  which  affirms  that  in 
Art  we  are  able  to  transcend  the  beauty  of  Nature,  and 
that  we  find  in  the  soul  a  criterion  of  what  is,  and  what  is 
not,  beautiful  in  Nature  ;  the  second,  which  says  that  all  we 
can  do  in  Art  is  to  collect  and  combine  the  Beauties  which 
Nature  exhibits.  He  holds  that  each  of  these  is  partly 
right  and  partly  wrong.  The  empiricists  are  right  in  laying 
stress  on  the  psychological  and  physiological  elements  in 
aesthetics  ;  but  they  only  succeed  in  proving  the  "  world- 
citizenship  "  of  the  beautiful.  The  idealists,  again,  are 
right  in  tracing  the  origin  of  aesthetic  judgment  to  some- 
thing which  lies  beyond  consciousness,  antecedent,  and  a 
priori.  The  abstract  ideal  of  the  intuitionalists,  as  a  vague 

]  unity,  is  untenable.  The  Beautiful  must  incarnate  itself  in 
the  concrete,  and  can  thus  only  be  understood.  Neverthe- 
less aesthetic  carries  with  it,  and  in  it,  a  formal  principle  ; 
and  it  is  only  when  the  ideal  is  unconsciously  made  real, 
when  the  abstract  is  embodied  in  the  concrete,  that  the 
Beautiful  is  understood.  Both  "the  discovery  of  the 
Beautiful,  and  the  creation  of  the  Beautiful  by  man,  proceed 
from  unconscious  processes,"  the  results  of  which  become 
conscious.  "  The  underlying  unconscious  process  is  en- 

.  tirely  withdrawn  from  introspection." 

Eighteen  years  after  the  publication  of  the  first  edition  of 


viii  The  Philosophy  of  Germany  81 

the  Philosophic  des  Unbewussten,  von  Hartmann  issued  at 
Berlin  Die  deutsche  Aesthetik  seit  Kant  (1886).  In  this 
work  he  tells  us  that  he  considered  Kant  as  the  source  of 
all  subsequent  aesthetic  science  in  Germany  ;  and  he  goes 
on  to  discuss  (i)  the  history  of  German  Aesthetik,  as  an 
evolution  of  Kantian  thought,  and  (2)  the  treatment  of  such 
questions  as  the  ugly,  the  comic,  the  tragic,  and  the 
humorous,  ending  by  a  discussion  of  unsolved  problems, 
such  as  the  relation  of  Architecture  to  the  other  Arts,  the 
different  tendencies  in  Music,  the  classification  of  the  Arts, 
and  their  unity. 

In  the  following  year  a  much  more  elaborate  contribu-- 
tion  to  the  Philosophic  des  Schbnen  was  made  by  von 
Hartmann,  in  the  "  zweiter  systematischer  Theil "  of  his 
Aesthetik.  In  the  first  part  of  this  volume  he  discusses  the 
conception  of  the  Beautiful,  its  contraries,  its  modifications, 
its  place  in  Man  and  in  Nature  ;  and  in  the  second  part  he 
treats  of  Beauty  as  realised  in  Nature,  in  History,  and  in 
the  Arts.  He  opposes  the  two  extremes  of  the  ultra-object- 
ive and  ultra-subjective  view  of  the  nature  of  Beauty.  A 
work  of  Art  is  objectively  real,  but  only  its  subjective  effect 
is  beautiful.  The  Ding-an-sich  is  not  beautiful.  The  artist 
deals  with  the  thing  in  itself,  which  is  not  beautiful,  and 
transforms  it  into  beauty. 

Hartmann's  theory  of  aesthetic  beauty  is  expressed  inf 
the  word  "  Schein,"  to  which  he  gives  a  peculiar  meaning. 
The  aesthetic  "  shine "  is  not  either  in  outward  objects 
(landscape,  picture,  air-vibrations,  etc.)  or  in  the  mind.  It 
is  occasioned  by  outward  objects,  made  by  artists  or  other- 
wise, and  is  capable  of  summoning  the  "  shine  "  before  the 
mind  of  all  normally  constituted  people.  He  talks  of  eye- 
shine,  ear-shine,  imagination -shine,  and  in  this  "shine" 
only  is  beauty  present.  The  subjective  phenomenon  alone 
is  beautiful.  No  external  reality  is  essential  to  it,  provided 
only  this  aesthetic  shine  is  set  up  by  whatever  means.  In 
natural  beauty,  however,  the  shine  cannot  be  dissevered  from 
the  reality.  A  painter  sees  the  "shine"  at  once,  as  some- 
thing different  from  the  real  objects  ;  so  may  we,  if,  for 
example,  we  look  at  a  landscape  with  inverted  head  !  This 

„_ 


82  TJie  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

\  plan,  however,  does  not  answer  in  a  room  !  It  is  only  the 
subjective  phenomenon,  however,  absolved  from  reality,  that 
makes  an  aesthetic  relation  possible. 

The  "  shine  "  does  not  pretend  to  be  true,  in  any  sense. 
We  must  avoid  the  expression  "phenomenon,"  "appear- 
ance," in  connection  with  it,  as  this  suggests  objective 
reality,  which  is  quite  irrelevant.  The  "shine"  is  not  a 
mental  perception,  it  does  not  deal  with  an  idea,  "  the  idea  of 
the  beautiful  " ;  and  no  supersensuous  idea  of  the  beautiful  is 
at  all  necessary.  In  fact,  the  pretensions  of  transcendental 
aesthetic  have  brought  the  study  into  disrepute.  "  Shine  "  is 

•not  the  same  as  a  picture,  unless  picture  be  taken  in  a 
psychical  or  intellectual  sense  ;  otherwise,  a  "  picture  "  is  a 
real  thing,  while  "  shine  "  is  not.  It  is  also  to  be  distin- 
guished from  "form." 

As  a  picture  stands  to  the  thing  pictured,  as  form 
stands  to  substance,  so  does  aesthetic  shine  stand  to  the 
subject.  The  subject  disappears  before  it ;  not  only  do  the 
interests  of  self  disappear,  but  the  very  ego  itself.  The 
subject  disappears  from  the  subjective  side  of  consciousness, 
and  it  emerges  again  on  the  objective  side.  The  aesthetic 
"shine"  is  thus  a  disintegration  of  the  ego,  yet  it  is  not  an 
illusion.  It  is  a  reality  of  consciousness.  Beauty  reveals 
itself  to  us  in  a  series  of  steps,  but  at  the  last  it  remains  a 
mystery,  and  without  mystery  there  would  be  no  beauty. 
There  must  be  in  every  work  of  art,  as  well  as  in  every 
material  object  that  is  beautiful,  something  that  we  feel  but 
do  not  know,  something  that  we  apprehend  but  do  not 
comprehend. 

7.  Lot ze  to  Jitngmann 

Rudolf  Hermann  Lotze  (1817-1881),  before  he  wrote  the 
work  by  which  he  is  chiefly  known,  the  Microcosmus,  had 
issued  two  books  on  ^Esthetic — the  first  On  the  Conception 
of  Beauty,  in  1846;  and  the  second  On  the  Conditions  of 
Beauty  in  Art,  in  1848.  In  1868  he  wrote  the  Geschichte 
der  Aesthetik  in  Deutschland,  which  was  the  part  he  was 
asked  to  take  in  the  elaborate  History  of  the  Sciences  in 


vin  The  Philosophy  of  Germany  83 

Germany,  prepared  by  several  contributors,  for  the  Royal 
Academy  of  Sciences.  This  work  has  three  main  divisions 
— (i)  the  history  of  the  standpoints  from  which  the  Beauti- 
ful has  been  discovered,  (2)  the  history  of  the  fundamental 
aesthetic  ideas,  and  (3)  the  history  of  the  theories  of  Art.  It 
is  a  critical  history  throughout.  In  the  Microcosmus  there 
is  a  chapter  (VIII.  iii.)  on  "Beauty  and  Art."  In  it  he 
treats  somewhat  rhetorically  of  Eastern  vastness,  Hebrew 
sublimity,  Greek  Beauty,  Roman  elegance  and  dignity,  of 
the  individuality  and  fantastic  elements  in  Medievalism, 
and  of  Beauty  and  Art  in  modern  life.  Notes  of  the 
Lectures  on  ./Esthetic,  which  he  delivered  in  1856,  were 
revised  by  M.  Rehnisch,  and  published  in  1884  ;  but  Lotze's 
specific  teaching  on  the  subject  of  the  Beautiful  is  not  nearly 
so  valuable  as  his  criticism  of  the  philosophical  theories  of 
others.  He  held  that  the  things  we  call  beautiful  do  not 
please  us  as  individuals  only,  they  please  the  universal 
spirit  in  us.  The  beautiful  in  itself  cannot  be  a  character- 
istic common  to  all  beautiful  objects.  Beauty,  however, 
actualises  itself,  both  in  the  types  of  individual  beings,  and 
in  events.  It  is  disclosed  in  their  characteristics  ;  and  in 
the  agreement  between  the  free  activity  of  any  single 
living  being  and  the  universal  laws*- "df^ature  it  finds 
expression.  To  impress  us  as  beautiful,  Art  must  first 
please  the  senses  (a  physiological  condition) ;  it  must 
secondly  conform  to  general  laws  (a  psychological  condition). 
In  other  parts  of  his  philosophy  Lotze  was  much  influenced 
by  Herbart,  but  in  his  aesthetic  he  took  a  line  of  his  own. 

Carl  Schnasse  (1798-1875)  wrote  a  history  of  Art  in 
seven  volumes,  which  he  finished  in  1862.  In  the  Intro- 
duction to  this  History,  Schnasse  discusses  the  nature  of 
the  Beautiful.  He  holds  that  there  is  no  more  mystery  in! 
Beauty  than  there  is  in  Religion  and  Morals  ;  but  that  per-; 
feet  Beauty  does  not  exist  in  the  world  of  actual  appearance. 
There  is  an  approach  toward  it  in  Nature ;  but  Art  gives 
us  what  Nature  does  not  and  cannot  give.  In  the  energy 
and  manipulative  freedom  of  the  Ego,  constructing  aj 
harmony  which  is  not  found  in  Nature,  Beauty  is  disclosed. 
It  is  thus  the  creation  of  man.  The  human  phantasy, 


84  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

however,  if  left  to  itself,  would  not  conduct  us  to  Beauty,  but 
rather  to  vagary.  We  must  therefore  distinguish  art  from 
artifice  and  the  artificial.  We  do  not  find  the  Beautiful,  or 
pick  it  up,  as  it  were  ;  we  construct  it ;  but  then,  we  do  not 
elaborate  it  by  artifice.  We  discover  it  by  second  sight. 
Were  an  artist  deliberately  to  sit  down  and  set  himself  to 
construct  a  beautiful  thing,  he  would  fail.  The  artist  works 
spontaneously,  and  almost  unconsciously,  by  a  natural  im- 
pulse which  is  freely  creative. 

In  the  thirteenth  and  nineteenth  chapters  of  H.  L.  F.  von 
Helmholtz's  great  work,  Die  Lehre  von  der  Tonempfin- 
dungen,  als  physiologische  Grundlage  fur  die  Theorie  der 
Musik  (1863),  there  is  much  that  is  valuable  on  the  aesthetic 
relations  of  Music  ;  the  rest  of  the  work  being  devoted  to 
its  scientific  relations.  At  the  close  of  his  book,  with 
characteristic  modesty  Helmholtz  says  that  while  he  could 
not  avoid  mixing  up  the  aesthetic  with  the  physical  problem, 
it  was  with  the  latter  alone  that  he  felt  at  home.  In  the 
former  he  was  too  much  of  an  amateur,  and  its  problems 
were  really  more  difficult.  Nevertheless  there  is  probably 
more  in  Helmholtz's  volume  bearing  directly  on  the 
aesthetic  of  music  than  in  any  other  German  work,  with  the 
single  exception  of  Wagner's  Beethoven. 

Helmholtz  saw  that  in  discussing  the  principles  of  music 
from  the  physical  side,  we  are  simply  investigating  the  laws 
of  phenomenal  sequence.  -  It  is  quite  different  in  the 
aesthetic  of  music,  when  we  ask  what  music  expresses  and 
discloses.  The  following  is  the  proposition  with  which  the 
third  part  of  his  treatise  begins  : — "  The  system  of  scales, 
etc.,  does  not  rest  solely  upon  unalterable  natural  laws,  but 
is  at  least  partly  also  the  result  of  aesthetical  principles 
which  have  already  changed,  and  will  still  further  change, 
with  the  progressive  development  of  humanity."  It  does  not 
follow  from  this  that  the  determination  of  these  principles 
is  arbitrary.  The  rules  of  Art  are  the  result  of  the  free 
effort  of  artists  to  shape  forms  of  Beauty  for  themselves,  but 
they  all  conform  to  law,  even  when  new  types  are  evolved. 

Comparing  the  development  of  Music  with  that  of  Archi- 
tecture, as  the  horizontal  line  of  roof,  the  circular  arch,  and 


viii  TJie  Philosophy  of  Germany  85 

the  pointed  arch  have  successively  evolved  themselves  ;  so, 
from  the  simple  melody  of  the  ancients,  through  the  "  poly- 
phonic" music  of  the  middle  age,  we  reach  the  richer 
harmony  of  the  modern  world. 

In  his  fourteenth  chapter  Helmholtz  points  out  that  the 
motion  of  tone  surpasses  all  other  motions,  in  the  delicacy 
and  ease  with  which  it  can  receive  and  imitate  the  most 
varied  kinds  of  expression.  Music  can  thus  represent 
states  of  mind  which  the  other  arts  can  only  indirectly 
touch.  We  have  no  means  of  expressing  what  Vischer 
calls  the  "mechanics  of  mental  emotion"  so  exactly  or 
delicately  as  by  music  ;  although  different  listeners  may 
describe  the  impressions  produced  on  them  by  the  same 
music  in  different  ways.  The  construction  of  scales  is  not 
arbitrary,  although  it  is  the  product  of  artistic  invention. 
The  physiological  structure  of  the  ear  has  something  to  do 
with  the  result.  Thus  physiological  laws  are  the  building- 
stones  with  which  the  edifice  of  the  musical  system  is  set 
up.  But  just  as  people  of  diverse  taste  in  architecture  can 
erect  very  different  buildings  with  the  same  stones,  so  by 
means  of  the  same  physiological  apparatus  of  the  ear  very 
different  musical  structures  can  be  built.  In  working  out 
the  system  of  scales,  keys,  chords  (of  all  that  is  known  as 
thorough-bass),  from  the  days  of  Terpander  and  Pythagoras, 
men  have  been  dealing  with  laws,  and  conforming  to  law  ; 
and  yet  it  has  all  been  the  result  of  artistic  invention.  The 
creation  of  beauty,  in  every  kind  of  musical  composition, 
is  invariably  wrought  out  in  obedience  to  laws  ;  but  these 
laws  are  not  consciously  present  in  the  mind  of  the  artist 
who  creates  the  result.  "Art  creates,"  says  Helmholtz,' 
"as  imagination  pictures,  regularly  without  conscious  law, 
designedly  without  conscious  aim."  One  who  is  aesthetic- 
ally educated  recognises  the  Beautiful  instinctively  andr 
directly,  without  consciously  referring  it  to  any  law.  But 
the  judgment  that  one  thus  passes  is  no  individual  judgment. 
It  is  universal  and  impersonal,  in  the  sense  that  the  indivi- 
dual passing  it  demands,  and  rightly  demands,  the  assent 
of  every  other  educated  nature.  There  is  room  for  indivi-^ 
dual  and  sectional  peculiarities  of  taste,  but  the  limits  within  ' 


86  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

'which  they  are  confined  are  narrow  ones.  We  see  in 
each  individual  work  of  musical  Art  "the  picture  of  a 
similar  arrangement  of  the  universe,  governed  by  law  and 
reason  in  all  its  parts." 

There  follows,  however,  an  important  addendum.  "It 
is  an  essential  condition  that  the  whole  extent  and  design 
of  a  work  of  Art  should  not  be  apprehended  consciously. 
It  is  precisely  from  that  part  of  it  which  escapes  our  con- 
scious apprehension  that  a  work  of  Art  exalts  and  delights 
us,  and  that  the  chief  effects  of  the  artistically  beautiful 
proceed  ;  not  from  the  part  we  are  able  fully  to  analyse." 

Gustav  Theodor  Fechner  (1834-1887)  was  more  a 
physicist  than  a  metaphysician,  a  naturalist,  and  a  brilliant 
literary  essayist.  In  his  Elemente  der  Psycho -physik  he 
worked  out  a  philosophy  of  Nature  almost  on  the  principles 
of  Positivism.  He  starts  from  an  idealistic  root,  not  very 
different  from  the  Cartesian  self-consciousness  ;  but  through 
this  he  reaches  an  objective  Ding-an-sick,  which  gives  rise  to 
consciousness,  and  becomes  dualistic.  In  1871  he  wrote 
an  essay  on  ^-Esthetic,  which  excited  a  good  deal  of  atten- 
tion in  Germany.  It  was  limited  to  an  exposition  and  test 
of  Zeising's  aurea  sectio.  In  his  Vorschule  der  Aesthetik 
(1876)  he  treats  of  the  laws  or  principles  according  to 
which  our  sense-perception  of  objects  pleases  us,  and  leads 
us  to  call  the  objects  which  give  rise  to  it  beautiful.  His 
method  is  inductive  and  psychological,  in  contrast  to  the 
deductive  and  metaphysical  treatment  so  much  in  vogue  in 
Germany.  There  is  an  obviously  close  link  of  connection 
between  his  psycho-physics  and  his  aesthetic  doctrine,  while 
the  latter  is  at  the  outset  based  upon  a  hedonistic  doctrine 
fof  life.  First,  a  sensation  must  "cross  the  threshold"  of 
consciousness  ;  second,  several  sensations  must  combine  to 
support  each  other,  and  they  give  more  pleasure  in  union 
than  each  and  all  of  them  can  give  separately ;  third,  there 
must  be  "  manifoldness " ;  fourth,  "reality"  or  "truth"; 
fifth,  there  must  be  "  clearness "  in  the  object  perceived ; 
and  sixth,  the  principle  of  "  association  "  must  come  in  to 
intensify  the  feeling  of  the  beautiful.  We  have  thus  six 
principles,  which  may  be  regarded  as  Fechner's  laws  of 


viii  The  Philosophy  of  Germany  87 

aesthetic.  The  first  amounts  to  this,  that  aesthetic  feeling, ! 
like  all  sensation,  must  have  a  certain  intensity  or  quantity 
before  we  are  conscious  of  it,  must  come  up  to  that  "  thresh- 
old." But  if  itself  originally  "  below  the  threshold,"  it  may, 
by  combining  with  other  pleasurable  feelings,  produced  by 
other  stimuli,  get  above  it.  This  is  his  second  principle  ; 
and  the  two  are  indeed  one.  They  involve  each  other,  and 
neither  of  them  is  a  discovery  beyond  the  commonplace. 
The  third  is  the  old  principle  of  the  one  in  the  manifold  ; 
and  in  this  familiar  ground  Fechner  tries  to  determine  the 
extent  to  which  each  element  may  exist  with  a  minimum  of 
the  other.  His  fourth  and  fifth  principles  are  elementary 
ones,  scarcely  deserving  of  the  rank  he  gives  them  ;  and 
in  his  last  he  adopts  the  principle  of  association  as  a  solvent 
of  the  problems  of  Beauty  almost  as  fully  as  Alison  had 
done.  His  discussion,  however,  of  the  "  associations- 
princip,"  in  his  ninth  chapter,  is  extremely  able,  some- 
what novel,  and  varied.  He  afterwards  deals  with  the 
relations  of  Poetry  and  Painting,  the  subject  of  Taste,  its 
phases,  and  the  laws  which  govern  it.  Several  art-problems 
are  then  discussed  by  him  in  the  light  of  the  principles  he 
has  laid  down,  e.g.  the  relations  of  Art  to  Nature,  and  of 
Beauty  to  Art,  the  relation  of  form  to  matter  in  a  work  of 
Art,  and  the  rival  tendencies  of  the  idealists  and  realists. 
Both  of  the  latter  are  recognised  as  good.  Fidelity  to 
Nature  (its  imitation)  and  departure  from  it  (its  idealisation) 
are  each  necessary ;  but,  on  the  whole,  Fechner  more  than 
inclines  to  the  Aristotelian  imitation  and  realism.  He  also 
discusses  other  principles,  which  he  considers  important  in 
aesthetic,  viz.  those  of  contrast,  of  sequence,  and  of  recon- 
ciliation. 

Die  Entstehung  der  neueren  Aesthetik,  by  Heinrich  von 
Stein  (1886).  This  sketch  of  modern  ^Esthetic  starts  with 
those  writers  whom  its  author  regards  as  the  French  classi- 
cists of  the  seventeenth  century,  especially  Boileau ;  and, 
after  dealing  with  them,  passes  to  what  he  calls  the  "  English 
classicism"  of  Shaftesbury,  returns  to  Diderot,  Rousseau, 
the  Swiss  and  Italian  writers,  and  thence  to  Baumgarten 
and  Winckelmann.  The  evolution  of  modern  European 


88  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

thought  on  the  subject  of  Aesthetik  has  thus  been,  accord- 
ing to  von  Stein,  from  a  realistic  starting-point  through  the 
imitative  naturalism  of  Diderot,  to  the  romantic  naturalism 
of  Rousseau,  and  thence  to  the  classic  idealism  of  Winckel- 
mann  and  others. 

Julius  Bergmann,  Professor  of  Philosophy  in  the  Univer- 
sity of  Marburg,  published  in  1887  Ueber  das  Schbne.  It  is 
(as  the  author  says)  an  analytic  and  a  critico- historical 
work,  in  the  course  of  which  he  discusses  Kant,  Herbart, 
and  others.  The  determination  of  the  objective  nature  of 
Beauty  he  considers  a  quite  hopeless  task.  The  subjectivity 
of  Beauty  he  regards  as  a  conclusion  demonstrated  by 
science,  but  he  considers  Herbart's  doctrine  quite  consistent 
with  this.  It  is  impossible  to  say  what  Beauty  is  in  itself; 
but  we  may  arrive  at  strictly  scientific  conclusions  as  to 
what  pleases  the  individual,  and  therefore  as  to  what  is 
beautiful  to  him. 

Aesthetik)  by  J.  Jungmann,  Professor  of  Philosophy  and 
Theology  in  the  University  at  Innsbruck  (who  died  in  1885), 
deals  both  with  the  fundamental  ideas  of  Aesthetik,  and  with 
the  several  Arts  in  detail.  His  doctrine  is  a  development 
of  the  Aristotelic-Thomistic  view,  and  in  the  first  half  of 
his  first  volume  (§§  i.-iii.)  he  discusses  the  essential  char- 
acteristics of  Beauty.  The  following  is  a  summary  of  his 
'teaching: — (i)  Beauty  as  such  is  a  suprasensible  quality  of 
things  (p.  23).  It  is  apprehended  by  the  rational  faculty, 
and  although  it  is  common  to  corporeal  and  incorporeal 
things,  it  is  more  perfect  in  the  latter,  and  has  its  proper 
sphere  in  the  ethical  life  of  beings  endowed  with  knowledge 
and  freedom.  (2)  Beauty  can  generate  pleasure  in  us  by 
our  merely  contemplating  it.  In  this  it  differs  from  the 
good,  which  is  the  object  of  desire.  (3)  Beauty  is  the 
foundation  of  love.  It  is  "  the  inner  goodness  of  things  in 
so  far  as  they  give  pleasure  to  the  rational  spirit."  "  Beauty 
(p.  150)  is  the  actual  agreement  or  harmony  of  things 
with  the  rational  mind,  in  so  far  as  they  give  it  pleasure." 
It  is  therefore  a  relative  attribute  of  things,  not  an  absolute 
one,  and  yet  it  is  not  purely  subjective.  Jungmann  deals 
next  with  the  sublime,  the  ludicrous,  and  with  the  subject 


VIII 


The  Philosophy  of  Germany  89 


of  grace,  etc.,  and  gives  a  criticism  of  hostile  views.  In 
his  second  volume  he  deals  with  the  Fine  Arts,  both 
generally  (pp.  3-173)  and  in  detail,  which  he  takes  up 
thus — Architecture  (pp.  173-213),  the  Drama  (pp.  223- 
254),  Sculpture  and  Painting  (pp.  254-380),  Oratory  (pp. 
380-402),  Poetry  (pp.  402-486),  Music  (pp.  484-566),  with 
a  final  section  on  Taste. 

8.    The  Literature  of  Denmark 

There  is  only  one  writer  of  importance  on  ^Esthetic  in 
the  literature  of  Denmark.  He  may  be  placed  at  the  close 
of  the  German  list. 

Hans  Christian  Oersted  (1777-1851),  Professor  of 
Physics  in  the  University  of  Copenhagen  from  1806 
onwards,  and  the  discoverer  of  electro-magnetism,  was  as 
much  interested  in  the  imaginative  as  in  the  scientific 
aspects  of  Nature.  While  yet  a  student  at  Copenhagen,  he 
obtained  the  University  gold  medal  on  "  the  limits  of  prose 
and  poetry."  His  chief  fame  is  as  a  physicist,  but  his 
essays  and  addresses  to  various  societies,  with  his  speeches 
and  papers  on  the  philosophy  of  Nature,  were  collected 
into  a  volume,  and  translated  from  German  into  English  in 
1852  by  L.  and  J.  B.  Horner.  These  papers  deal  with  the 
relations  of  science  and  poetry,  science  and  religion,  the 
spiritual  and  the  material,  and  of  the  philosophy  of  Beauty. 

There  are  three  sections  in  Oersted's  book  in  which 
Beauty  is  discussed — (i)  two  dialogues,  on  the  fundamental 
principles  of  Beauty,  and  on  the  physical  effects  of  Tones  ; 
(2)  two  chapters  on  the  Natural  Philosophy  of  the  Beauti- 
ful ;  and  (3)  a  section  on  the  unbeautiful  in  Nature,  in  its 
relation  to  the  harmony  of  Beauty  in  the  whole. 

The  outcome  of  the  first  of  these  dialogues  is  that  the 
pleasure  we  derive  from  Beauty  depends  both  on  reason 
and  on  the  senses.  Musical  tones,  for  example,  contain  a 
hidden  reason  within  them.  Symmetrical  figures,  which  • 
delight  us,  do  so  because  of  the  reason  that  is  in  the 
symmetry.  They  are  conformable  to  rule,  i.e.  to  reason. 
The  circle  is  a  perfect  figure,  because  it  unites  so  many 


90  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful       CH.  vm 

characteristics  in  its  unity.  It  is  not  a  mere  abstract  con- 
ception. It  is  an  entity  that  is  in  itself  beautiful,  because 
of  its  essential  idea.  We  find  in  the  circle  symmetry,  com- 
pletion, wholeness,  unity  in  variety.  The  external  image 
reaches  us  through  the  senses,  and  delights  us,  without  our 
being  conscious  of  the  ideas  which  it  contains,  and  which 
lie  within  it.  In  the  whole  realm  of  inorganic  Nature  we 
find  geometrical  forms  which  are  beautiful ;  and,  when  we 
pass  to  organic  Nature,  the  lines  and  angles  of  crystalline 
beauty  are  exchanged  for  the  curves  and  sinuosities  of  life 
and  organisation.  As  symmetry  lies  hid  in  crystals  and 
organisms,  reason  lies  hid  in  tones.  It  lies  there,  on  a 
firm  foundation  within  our  nature,  not  in  sense  only  but  in 
reason. 

This  is  the  outcome  of  the  dialogue,  originally  printed 
in  the  Transactions  of  the  Scandinavian  Society  in  1808. 
Twenty-five  years  later,  in  1833,  Oersted  wrote  a  second 
dialogue,  on  "The  Physical  Effects  of  Tones."  The  two 
chapters  on  the  Natural  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful  were 
written  later  still.  In  them  he  discusses  the  laws  of  sound 
and  of  colour,  in  minute  detail.  We  find  that  Nature  pro- 
duces the  same  forms  as  are  created  by  human  thought, 
and  that  what  are  thoughts  within  us  are  also  laws  of 
Nature  without  us.  We  thus  discover  that  the  laws  of 
Nature  are  the  laws  of  Reason,  and  that  all  Nature  reveals 
the  eternal  living  Reason.  "  Soul  and  Nature  are  one, 
seen  from  two  different  sides." 

Harold  Hoffding,  at  present  professor  at  the  University 
of  Copenhagen,  has  published  Outlines  of  Psychology ^  in  the 
6th  section  of  which  he  discusses  the  subject  of  aesthetic 
feeling.  In  the  main  he  follows  Schiller  and  Fechner.  He 
thinks  the  aesthetic  instincts  had  their  origin  in  the  tendencies 
which  lead  to  the  preservation  of  the  individual  and  the  race. 
Art  arose  out  of  the  struggle  for  existence,  and  the  love  of 
art  preceded  an  appreciation  of  the  beauty  of  Nature. 
Art  is  nearer  man  than  Nature  is.  We  owe  the  modern 
feeling  for  Nature  chiefly  to  Rousseau.  In  a  later  section, 
Hoffding's  remarks  on  the  Sublime,  which  are  partly  based 
on  those  of  Kant,  are  noteworthy. 


CHAPTER    IX 

THE    PHILOSOPHY    OF    FRANCE 

i.  Descartes 

No  better  evidence  of  the  close  inter-relation  of  all  specu- 
lative problems  can  be  found  than  is  to  be  seen  in  the 
beginnings  of  Philosophy  in  France.  Descartes — the 
founder  of  modern  Philosophy — wrote  nothing  on  the  sub- 
ject of  the  Beautiful,  but  the  influence  of  Cartesianism  is 
visible  in  the  earliest  efforts  of  French  Art,  and  its  root- 
principle  is  still  more  apparent  in  the  literature  of  ^Esthetics, 
as  soon  as  it  took  definite  shape  in  France. 

The  earliest  French  writers  on  the  Beautiful  drew  their 
inspiration  from  St.  Augustine,  but  the  ideal  tendency — 
the  intellectual  parentage  of  which  may  always  be  traced 
back  to  Plato — had  a  metaphysical  embodiment  in  Des- 
cartes ;  and  so  soon  as  idealism  began  to  ripen  and  bear 
fruit  in  France,  its  influence  was  seen  both  in  art-theory  and 
art-production.  In  the  seventeenth  century,  French  art 
was  more  ideal  and  constructive,  than  real  and  imitative  ; 
and  it  is  noteworthy  that  while  Pere  Andre  looked  to  St. 
Augustine  as  his  guide,  he  really  embodied  and  wrought 
out  the  teaching  of  Plato. 

Descartes  was  a  voluminous  correspondent :  1 1 6  of  his 
letters  were  published  in  1683,  but  only  three  of  them  refer 
to  Literature  as  distinct  from  Philosophy.  In  the  first  of 
these  Descartes  praises  his  friend  Balzac  for  certain  qualities 
which  he  thought  characterised  his  work.  The  first  of  them 
is  purity  of  diction.  This,  says  Descartes,  is  to  literary 


92  The  Pliilosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

style,  what  health  is  to  the  body.  "  Quand  on  la  possede, 
on  n'y  pense  plus."  This  purity  of  diction  is  a  sign  of  unity 
between  thought  and  style — the  style  being  the  body,  and 
the  thought  being  the  soul.  A  perfect  style  resembles  a 
geometrical  figure,  of  which  the  beauty  lies  in  symmetry. 
A  mingling  of  contraries  is  monstrous.  Inequality,  irregu- 
larity, and  complexity  in  literary  work  are  to  be  condemned  ; 
and  those  in  whose  writings  they  occur  are — (i)  those 
who  have  too  many  words  and  too  few  ideas,  felicitous 
language  but  ignoble  thought ;  (2)  those  who  have  lofty  or 
sublime  thought,  but  who  express  it  in  an  obscure  manner, 
or  who  have  too  much  thought  and  too  little  experience  ; 
(3)  those  who  have  abundance  of  words,  yet  who  clothe 
their  thoughts  badly  ;  (4)  those  who  indulge  in  bons  mots, 
jeux  d'esprit,  equivoques,  poetic  fiction,  sophistry,  or  super- 
subtilty.  Descartes  believed  that  his  correspondent  Balzac 
avoided  these  four  faults. 

In  his  second  letter  Descartes  vindicates  the  function 
of  imagination.  He  wrote  to  Balzac  that  "sleep  led  him 
to  the  woods,  gardens,  and  enchanted  palaces,  where  he 
enjoyed  all  the  pleasure  imagined  in  fables."  Baillet,  in 
his  Vie  de  M.  Descartes,  tells  us  that  he  believed  in  dreams, 
analysing  and  interpreting  them  with  a  semi-scientific  and 
half-superstitious  curiosity. 

In  the  third  letter  Descartes's  feeling  towards  Nature 
comes  out — picturesque  Nature,  the  country  loved  of  artists 
and  poets.  He  urged  Balzac  to  come  to  Amsterdam,  be- 
cause it  would  be  quite  as  pleasant  to  see  the  products  of 
Nature  arriving  from  distant  countries,  in  the  form  of  mer- 
chandise, as  to  watch  them  growing  in  the  fields.  He 
would  almost  have  agreed  with  Samuel  Johnson,  that  it  was 
better  to  walk  down  Cheapside  than  to  take  a  stroll  in  the 
green  fields  of  Surrey.  In  this  we  see  a  tendency  which 
was  developed  in  the  next  generation,  and  was  dominant  in 
Rabelais  and  Montaigne.  There  was  no  appreciation  of 
Nature  for  its  own  sake  in  Descartes,  and  very  little  of  it 
even  in  the  French  literature  of  the  seventeenth  century. 
It  was  human  nature  alone  that  was  interesting.  Never- 
theless Cartesianism  sought  to  unite  the  best  things  in 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  93 

ancient  literature  with  the  inheritances  of  Catholicism,  a 
certain  freedom  of  spirit  in  investigation  with  a  deference 
to  authority. 

It  is  in  Boileau  that  we  see  the  literary  reflection  of  the' 
philosophy  of  Descartes.  Beauty  was  supposed  to  lie  in 
reasonableness,  good  sense,  literary  proportion,  there  being 
no  room  allowed  for  fresh  imaginative  departures.  It  was 
expressed  in  the  formula  "rien  n'est  beau  que  le  vrai."  As' 
Descartes  sought  for  the  True  in  a  universal  principle  valid 
for  all  intelligence,  Boileau  sought  for  the  Beautiful  in  a 
universal  element,  vouched  for  by  an  intellectual  criterion. 
To  the  test  of  the  "  clare  et  distincte  "  in  Descartes  corre- 
sponds the  "clarte'"  or  luminousness  of  Boileau.  And 
just  as  Pascal  differed  somewhat  from  Descartes  in  his 
test,  admitting  within  the  range  of  his  vision  things  that 
are  not  perceived  "  clare  et  distincte " ;  so  Corneille  and 
others,  in  Poetry  and  Art,  to  a  certain  extent  broke  away 
from  classic  rules,  the  intellectual  canons  and  unities  of  the 
past.  Cartesianism  was,  after  all,  a  realistic  movement  as 
compared  with  the  schools  to  which  it  gave  rise.  Its  insist- 
ence on  truth,  the  whole  truth,  and  nothing  but  the  truth,  was 
somewhat  alien  to  high  art ;  but  its  motto,  "  rien  n'est  beau 
que  le  vrai,"  might  really  be  taken  as  equivalent  to  "  rien 
n'est  beau,  s'il  n'est  pas  vrai."  Thus  interpreted,  the  dictum 
of  Boileau  is  not  opposed  to  idealism,  it  is  only  its  sober 
realistic  base ;  and  adopting  it,  it  is  easy  to  see  how  he 
should  prefer  the  Homeric  simplicity  and  the  Horatian 
directness  to  the  mystic  fancies  and  the  vague  idealisations 
of  other  writers. 

It  was  perhaps  due  to  the  fact  that  Descartes  was  a 
trained  mathematician,  and  that  he  had  tried,  in  elaborating 
his  "  method,"  to  follow  in  the  footsteps  of  the  geometricians, 
that  he  wished  to  bring  the  department  of  aesthetics  (so 
far  as  he  recognised  it)  under  the  control  of  metaphysical 
or  even  mathematical  formulae,  and  make  it  an  "exact 
science." 

It  will  be  seen  that  some  of  the  points  which  are  most 
prominent  in  Pere  Andrews  theory  of  Beauty  find  their 
intellectual  parentage  in  Descartes  ;  and  we  may  perhaps 


94  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

even  trace  the  saying  of  Buffon,  "  le  style  c'est  1'homme,"  to 
the  Cartesian  doctrine  that  truth  is  independent  of  the 
individual,  not  invented  by  him,  and  that  the  function  of 
each  is  the  right  ordering  of  his  own  thought.  There  is 
no  doubt  that  the  ideal  realism  of  Descartes  coloured  the 
literature  of  France  in  the  period  of  its  greatest  glory  in 
the  seventeenth  century,  and  that  its  decadence  was  due  to 
its  abandonment — in  aesthetic  (as  in  metaphysic  and  ethic) — 
of  the  principles  which  guided  its  first  essays.  Excessive 
subjectivity  and  imitation,  instead  of  objectivity  and  idealisa- 
tion, gave  rise,  as  a  necessary  consequence,  to  mannerisms, 
to  tricks  of  cleverness,  to  artifice  instead  of  art,  to  mimicry 
and  dilettantism  instead  of  simplicity,  nature,  and  truth. 


2.  Crousaz  to  Buffier 

It  was  not  till  the  beginning  of  the  eighteenth  century 
that  an  attempt  was  made  in  France  to  discuss  the  question 
of  the  Beautiful  philosophically  ;  but  influences  were  at  work 
in  the  seventeenth  century  preparing  the  way  for  it. 

The  Port-Royalists  were  occupied  with  other  problems, 
but  a  phrase  of  Pierre  Nicole's  (1625-95),  "  Pulchritudinis 
fontem  in  veritate  esse,"  may  be  noted  as  having  perhaps 
indirectly  given  rise  to  Boileau's  dictum,  "rien  n'est  beau 
que  le  vrai."  The  indirect  work  of  Boileau  (1636-1711) — 
who  was  dictator  of  letters  to  France  for  many  years,  and  a 
better  critic  than  an  original  writer — should  also  be  noted. 
It  was  a  sort  of  literary  seed-sowing,  of  which  the  harvest 
was  afterwards  reaped  in  other  than  literary  fields.  Sub- 
sequently the  work  of  such  men  as  Rousseau — who  wrote 
nothing  directly  on  Beauty,  but  whose  name  is  specially  iden- 
tified with  a  return  to  Nature,  and  who  introduced  a  new  way 
of  looking  on  many  problems — must  be  taken  into  account 
in  any  estimate  of  the  philosophical  tendencies  of  France. 

While  French  literature  has  not  been  so  constructive  as 
that  of  Germany,  either  in  the  department  of  Esthetics,  or 
in  that  of  intellectual  or  Moral  Philosophy,  it  has  the  merit 
of  greater  clearness.  If  not  in  literary  criticism  generally, 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  95 

in  art-criticism  at  any  rate,  the  French  writers,  until  recently, 
moved  on  a  higher  level  of  insight  than  the  Germans. 
With  the  exception  of  Winckelmann's  History  of  Ancient 
Art,  Schiller's  Letters,  and  Hegel's  Aesthetik,  Germany  has 
produced  nothing  so  admirable  in  this  direction  as  much 
that  has  proceeded  from  its  political  rival. 

The  literature  of  France,  however,  includes  that  of 
Switzerland,  and  the  earliest  contribution  to  ^Esthetics  in 
the  French  language  was  by  a  Swiss,  who  held  a  philo- 
sophical chair,  first  in  his  own  country,  and  afterwards  in 
Holland.  Passing  over  the  Lettres  sur  le  bon  Gout,  by  the 
Abbe  Bellegarde  (1708),  and  the  Discours  sur  le  bon  Goiit, 
by  J.  F.  du  Tremblay  (1713),  the  first  book  of  any  value 
was  the  Traite  du  Beau,  by  J.  P.  de  Crousaz  (1663-1748), 
first  Professor  of  Philosophy  and  of  Mathematics  in  the 
Academy  of  Lausanne,  and  afterwards  at  Groningen.  It 
was  published  at  Amsterdam  in  1712.  Crousaz  was  also 
the  author  of  a  Logic,  which  appeared  at  Amsterdam  in  the 
same  year.  This  little  treatise  has  thus  a  historical  im- 
portance in  excess  of  its  speculative  merits. 

Crousaz  held  that  Beauty  is  not  known  by  us  as  absolute, 
but  that  the  word  expresses  the  relation  in  which  the  objects 
we  call  beautiful  stand  to  our  intellect  and  to  our  feelings. 
The  word  belongs,  in  this  respect,  to  the  same  class  as  the 
word  "  Truth  "  or  "  Honesty."  Every  one  who  rises  above  ! 
mere  custom,  when  he  says  a  thing  is  beautiful  means  that 
he  perceives  something  which  he  approves,  and  which  gives 
him  pleasure.  (He  distinguishes  objects  which  please  the 
mind,  from  those  which  please  the  heart.)  It  is  not  neces- 
sary, however,  that  in  order  to  be  beautiful  an  object  must' 
give  pleasure.  We  may  recognise  beauty  in  that  which  gives 
pain.  The  characteristics  of  Beauty,  according  to  Crousaz, 
are  variety,  unity,  regularity,  order,  and  proportion.  But  in  a 
subsequent  chapter  he  seems  to  lay  chief  stress  on  the  three- 
fold characteristic  of  unity  in  variety,  proportion,  and  fitness. 
An  object  is  beautiful  ( i )  when  it  includes  within  it  diversities 
reduced  to  unity,  which  occupy  the  mind  without  fatiguing 
it ;  (2)  when  it  has  proportion  well  sustained  ;  and  (3)  when 
it  is  well  fitted  to  its  place.  One  does  not  require,  however, 


96  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

'to  postpone  his  judgment  as  to  the  beauty  of  an  object 
until  he  recognises  these  three  things  as  present,  because 
Beauty  forces  itself  upon  us  spontaneously.  It  triumphs 
over  us,  and  our  heart  responds  to  it  without  the  aid  of 
reason.  The  question  then  is,  has  it  a  basis  in  the  nature 
•of  things,  or  is  its  basis  caprice  ?  To  determine  this  we 
must  go  to  the  root  of  human  nature,  and  to  the  radical 
principle  of  the  universe,  which  is  harmony.  The  harmony 
between  Man  and  Nature,  however,  is  not  perfect.  There 
is  a  chaotic  element  in  human  nature,  and  evils  of  all  sorts 
exist  around  it  and  within.  Derangements  of  body  and 
mind,  due  to  inheritance  and  to  education,  have  artificialised 
human  taste.  Nevertheless  an  object  in  which  many  diver- 
sities are  brought  together  and  united  in  harmony,  and  which 
is  well  proportioned  and  fitted  to  its  end,  is  beautiful.  This 
is  a  summary  of  the  teaching  of  Crousaz. 

The  Latin  poem  of  Dufresnoy,  De  Arte  Graphica,  deserves 
a  passing  notice.  When  Charles  Alphonse  du  Fresnoy 
(1611-1658),  who  had  studied  Painting  and  the  conventional 
Art  of  Poetry  both  in  France  and  in  Italy,  returned  to  his 
native  country,  he  appeared  both  as  artist  and  verse-writer. 
His  poem  on  the  Art  of  Painting  is  chiefly  interesting  from 
the  fact  that  it  was  translated  into  English  prose  by  Dryden, 
who  prefixed  to  it  an  Introduction  of  his  own,  much  more 
interesting  than  the  book  itself,  in  which  he  traces  a 
parallel  between  poetry  and  painting.  It  was  also  trans- 
lated into  English  verse  by  W.  Mason.  So  far  as  poetry 
goes,  Dufresnoy's  work  is  as  dull  as  ditch-water.  Even 
Fusseli  says  of  it  (Introduction  to  Lectures  on  Painting,  Part 
II.  p.  xv.)  :  "  From  his  text  no  one  ever  rose  practically  wiser 
than  when  he  sat  down  to  the  study  of  it."  Like  much  of 
the  conventional  sculptured  monuments  at  Westminster 
Abbey,  it  has  only  a  historical  interest,  as  a  mirror  of  the 
taste  of  the  age  that  thought  it  worthy  of  reproduction  in 
two  English  editions. 

Its  perusal  by  the  Abbe  Du  Bos,  member  and  "  per- 
petual secretary  "  of  the  French  Academy,  gave  rise  to  his 
Reflexions  critiques  sur  la  Poe'sie  et  la  Peinture  (1719).  If 
Dufresnoy's  poem  was  chiefly  interesting  from  the  fact  that 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  97 

Dryden  translated  it,  Dubos's  Reflexions  are  worthy  of 
note  mainly  because  Lessing  refers  to  them,  and  seems 
to  have  made  some  use  of  them  in  his  Laocoon,  In 
France,  however,  they  went  through  many  editions  ;  and 
the  fifth,  enlarged  by  the  author,  was  translated  into  Eng- 
lish by  Thomas  Nugent,  and  published  in  London  in  three 
volumes  in  1748.  When  Dubos  wrote,  the  term  "Fine 
Art  "  was  not  in  current  use.  From  a  reluctance  to  drag 
down  the  vocation  of  the  poet  and  the  painter  to  that  of  a 
technical  workman,  Poetry  was  regarded  as  a  branch  of 
Literature  far  above  "Art."  Dubos's  discussion  gave  rise 
to  the  term  "  les  Beaux-Arts,"  and  indeed  nationalised  it. 
In  the  Traite  de  la  Peinture,  by  Daudre  Bardon  (1760),  the 
phrase  is  used  as  current  coin. 

To  trace  in  detail  the  history  of  the  ideas  as  to  Fine  Art 
entertained  in  France — as  to  what  it  should  include,  and 
what  it  should  exclude — would  be  an  interesting  chapter 
in  the  history  of  Esthetics.  Only  a  single  remark  can 
here  be  made.  In  the  seventeenth  century  certain  schools 
of  Painting  and  of  Sculpture  were  instituted.  A  school  of 
Architecture  followed.  In  1793  these  were  united  in  one,  an 
Ecole  des  Beaux-Arts.  When,  subsequently,  an  Academic 
des  Beaux-Arts  was  established,  Music  was  added.  Poetry 
was  left  out,  partly  because  it  could  not  be  taught,  and 
partly  from  an  idea  that  it  belonged  to  a  loftier  sphere.  In 
the  Dictionnaire  des  Sciences,  des  Lettres,  et  des  Arts,  the 
arts  of  Design  only  are  included  —  Painting,  Sculpture, 
Engraving,  Architecture,  Music,  and  Drawing.  (This  sub- 
ject, however,  belongs  to  the  history  of  the  Fine  Arts,  rather 
than  to  that  of  the  philosophy  of  the  Beautiful.) 

Towards  the  close  of  the  first  quarter  of  the  eighteenth 
century  we  find  the  subject  of  the  Beautiful  discussed  by 
the  Pere  Buffier  in  his  Traite  des  Ve'rites  premieres,  1724, 
a  work  which  did  not,  at  the  time  of  its  appearance, 
receive  the  attention  it  deserved.  In  the  thirteenth 
chapter  of  the  first  part  .of  this  Treatise,  he  proposes  to 
"  apply  the  rule  of  common-sense,  in  order  to  discover 
in  what  true  Beauty  consists."  On  reading  this  sentence, 
we  may  imagine  we  are  going  to  tread,  in  the  company  of 

H 


98  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beaut  if 2  tl         CHAP. 

Pere  Buffier,  those  steps  afterwards  made  so  familiar  to 
Scotsmen  by  Dr.  Thomas  Reid.  But  it  is  not  so.  "  What 
is  called  Beauty,"  he  writes,  "  seems  to  me  to  consist  in 
that  which  is  at  one  and  the  same  time  the  most  common 
and  the  most  rare  in  things  of  the  same  species  ;  or,  to  put 
it  otherwise,  it  is  that  particular  form  the  most  common  of 
all  the  forms  that  are  to  be  found  in  the  same  species  of 
things "  (c'est  la  disposition  particuliere  la  plus  commune, 
parmi  les  autres  dispositions  particulieres  qui  se  rencontrent 
dans  une  meme  espece  des  choses.  Traite  des  Verites 
premieres,  I.  ch.  xiii.  §  94).  After  giving  this  definition,  he 
sees  that  it  has  a  paradoxical  look  on  the  surface,  and 
that  it  requires  some  explanation.  He  therefore  selects  the 
human  face  as  an  illustration  of  his  principle  ;  and,  with  the 
view  of  showing  how  Beauty  is  both  rare  and  common,  he 
remarks  that  out  of  the  almost  infinite  variety  of  particular 
forms  which  the  human  face  assumes,  one  only  is  perfectly 
beautiful,  while  the  rest  fall  beneath  that  standard  of  per- 
fection ;  but  that  none  of  the  departures  from  this  perfect 
beauty  have  so  many  human  faces  formed  after  their  model 
as  are  formed  after  the  model  of  the  perfectly  beautiful.  In 
50  faces  there  may  be  only  one  amongst  them  that  is 
really  beautiful — this  makes  beauty  rare  ;  but  then  this 
one  beautiful  face  will  have  many  of  the  remaining  49 
formed  after  its  model  ;  while  no  single  one  of  the  49 
will  have  many  of  the  remaining  48  formed  on  its  model. 
Buffier  thought  the  same  principle  is  seen,  even  more  clearly, 
when  we  examine  the  different  parts  of  the  face  in  detail. 
Take  the  same  50  persons,  and  examine  their  foreheads, 
eyes,  mouths,  or  any  feature.  You  may  find,  say,  10  well- 
proportioned  ones,  formed  as  if  after  the  same  model.  Of 
the  remaining  40,  not  more  than  one  or  two  will  seem  to  be 
formed  after  the  same  model,  but  all,  or  nearly  all,  after 
different  ones.  It  will  be  found,  Buffier  thought,  that  the 
individual  parts  which  constitute  deformity  occur  rarely  in 
the  human  face,  and  that  the  parts  which  constitute  beauty 
are  much  more  common.  It  might  be  supposed  to  follow 
from  this  that  all  beautiful  faces  must  resemble  each  other. 
This  of  course  is  not  the  case,  and  Buffier  remarks  that 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  99 

"  however  beautiful  a  face  may  be,  its  parts  are  never  equally 
or  perfectly  beautiful."  If  they  were  so,  then  all  beautiful 
faces  would  resemble  each  other. 

He  makes  two  additional  remarks  which  are  noteworthy ' 
— viz.  ( i )  that  those  persons  whom  we  are  most  apt  to  mis- 
take, the  one  for  the  other,  are  those  who  approach  toward 
the  beautiful.  We  can  easily  distinguish  between  ugly 
faces,  or  at  least  much  more  easily  than  between  beautiful 
ones.  (2)  It  is  to  be  observed  that  painters  find  it  com- 
paratively easy  to  depict  ugly  faces  ;  it  is  more  difficult  for 
them  to  paint  the  handsome  or  the  young.  Those  that  are 
either  wrinkled  with  age,  or  have  assumed  some  characteristic 
departure  from  the  mean  of  beauty,  or  are  positively  ugly, 
are  much  more  easily  dealt  with  by  the  artist.  It  comes  to 
this,  that  relatively  perfect  forms  of  Beauty  (if  distinct  in 
type)  have  always  a  much  closer  resemblance  or  affinity 
with  each  other,  than  any  one  of  them  has  resemblance  or . 
affinity  with  departures  from  the  Beautiful. 

In  further  endeavouring  to  prove  his  thesis  that  Beauty 
consists  in  that  which  is  most  common  amongst  individuals 
of  the  same  species,  Buffier  comments  on  the  doctrine 
that  Beauty  consists  in  "  proportion."  He  at  once  asks  for 
a  standard  of  proportion,  and  says  that  what  is  ugly  is  so, 
simply  because  it  is  a  departure  from  the  common  form — 
that  a  monster  is  monstrous  only  because  it  has  nothing  in 
common  with  that  form  from  which  it  is  an  aberration. 
He  thus  justifies  his  seeming  paradox,  that  Beauty  is  both  ( 
the  most  common  and  the  most  rare  form  of  those  things 
which  meet  the  eye,  and  to  which  we  are  accustomed 
in  experience. 

It  is  a  curious  thing  that,  after  stating  a  doctrine  which 
really  implies  an  essential  principle  of  Beauty,  Buffier  should 
sink,  at  the  close  of  this  chapter,  to  so  low  an  intellectual 
level  as  to  admit  the  arbitrariness  of  the  Beautiful,  and  its 
relativity.  Not  only  in  reference  to  beauty  of  colour  and 
of  figure,  but  in  reference  to  the  standard  of  every  kind  of 
Beauty,  he  falls  back  upon  the  bare  suffrage  of  the  masses, 
mere  count  of  heads.  His  theory  had  no  speculative  root. 
It  was  not  based  (as  Plato's  was)  on  the  essential  and  the 


ioo  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

absolute,  but  it  recognised  a  kind  of  typical  form,  a  sort  of 
Aristotelic  mean  between  extremes.  Beauty  consisted  not 
in  anything  that  individuals  become,  but  in  the  type  after 
which  they  aim,  and  to  which  they  approximate ;  and 
although  each  one  fails  to  reach  it,  the  points  in  which 
each  most  nearly  approaches  to  the  type  are  its  most 
beautiful  points.  I  think  it  curious  that  Buffier  did  not  see 
the  affinity  of  his  own  theory  with  that  of  Plato,  with  which 
at  starting  it  had  really  more  in  common  than  with  the' 
Aristotelian  doctrine.  If  the  variations  and  departures  from 
the  medial  line  of  Beauty  all  resemble  it  more  than  they 
resemble  each  other,  they  surely  do  homage  to  it,  as  at  once 
more  universal  than  themselves,  and  as  ideal  in  contrast 
with  their  actuality. 

In  1736,  M.  Cartand  de  la  Vilete  published  an  Essai 
historique  et  philosophique,  sur  le  Gout,  but  it  has  no 
greater  significance  than  Rollin's  Reflexions  generates  sur  le 
Gout,  published  about  the  same  time.  Rollin  was  Principal 
of  the  University  of  Paris,  and  wrote  on  History  and  Belles- 
Lettres,  but  he  was  not  a  philosopher.  He  defined  Taste 
as  a  "kind  of  natural  reason  brought  to  perfection  by 
study."  It  is  innate  in  all,  but  only  in  some  are  its  seeds 
ever  brought  to  perfection. 

Several  works  of  interest  to  the  student  of  art  (though 
merely  as  links  in  the  evolving  chain  of  criticism)  were 
written  by  French  travellers  in  Italy  during  the  first  half  of 
the  eighteenth  century,  e.g.  in  1739-40.  The  President  de 
Brosses  sent  home  to  his  friends  a  series  of  Lettres  familieres 
on  Italian  life.  They  are  full  of  prejudice.  What  could 
be  more  deplorable  than  the  following  judgment  passed 
on  St.  Mark's,  Venice  : — "  C'est  un  vilain  -monument,  s'il 
en  fut  jamais,  massif,  sombre,  et  gothique,  du  plus  mediant 
gout  »!(!.§  174). 

3.  Andre  to  Diderot 

In  1741,  Pere  Andre  wrote  an  Essai  sur  le  Beau,  which 
was  in  some  respects  an  advance  on  the  discussion  of 
Crousaz  and  Buffier.  Andre's  is  not  a  profound  analysis, 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  101 

but  it  drew  its  inspiration  from  the  idealism  of  Male- 
branche,  reverting  to  that  of  Plato,  through  the  connecting 
link  of  St.  Augustine.  He  finds  Beauty  in  Nature,  in  Art, 
in  Mind  and  Morals ;  but  he  asks  what  Beauty  is  in  itself. 
Is  it  absolute  or  relative  ?  Is  it  fixed  so  as  to  please 
barbarian  and  civilised  alike,  and  to  be  independent  of 
individual  fluctuating  taste  ?  He  does  not  need  to  ask 
what  things  are  beautiful ;  the  great  question  is,  what  is 
Beauty  ?  In  answer  he  classifies  the  kinds  or  types  of 
Beauty  thus  : — (i)  There  is  an  essential  and  divine  Beauty. 
(2)  There  is  a  natural  Beauty,  quite  distinct  from  this, 
which  exists  in  the  world,  and  is  independent  of  human 
taste  or  opinion  about  it.  It  is  seen  both  in  colour  and  in 
form,  both  in  external  things  and  in  man.  (3)  There  is  a 
Beauty  that  is  an  arbitrary  and  artificial  product,  due  to 
association,  custom,  and  the  creation  of  individual  or 
national  taste.  The  recognition  of  these  three  orders — 
the  essential,  the  natural,  and  the  artificial — is  supposed  to 
go  to  the  root  of  the  difficulty  as  to  a  standard  of  taste. 
The  variations  in  judgment  and  feeling  which  exist  in 
reference  to  it  apply  only  to  the  third  of  the  three  kinds  of 
Beauty.  Pere  Andre  subdivides  the  kinds  of  Beauty  in  his 
three  classes,  without  adding  much  that  is  of  value.  The 
third  class  (artificial  Beauty)  he  trifurcates  thus — (i)  the 
beauty  of  Taste,  (2)  the  beauty  of  Genius,  (3)  the  beauty 
of  Caprice  ;  and  the  two  first,  he  maintains,  are  founded  on 
a  sentiment  of  natural  Beauty. 

Pere  Andre  influenced  Victor  Cousin  a  good  deal,  who 
edited  his  works,  with  copious  notes,  in  1843. 

Five  years  after  the  publication  of  the  Essai  du  Beau 
the  Abbe  Batteux  (1713-1780)  issued  a  volume  which  he 
called  Les  Beaux- Arts  reduits  a  im  m$me  Principe  (1746). 
This  was  followed  in  1765  by  a  Cours  de  Belles  Lettres. 
In  these  works  Batteux  tried  to  reduce  all  the  arts  to  one 
principle,  and  then  to  classify  them.  For  principle  he  falls 
back  on  the  imitation  of  Nature,  and  in  his  classification  he 
tries  to  bring  the  Arts  within  the  categories  of  space  and 
time,  those  belonging  to  each  category  being  able  to  unite 
and  produce  complex  effects.  Thus  he  thinks  that  Archi- 


102  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

tecture,  Sculpture,  and  Painting — all  appealing  to  the  sense 
of  sight,  and  being  illustrated  in  the  field  of  space — may 
combine  together  to  form  a  complex  whole  ;  while  music 
and  poetry  may  similarly  combine  in  time.  His  division  of 
the  Arts  is  altogether  arbitrary. 

In  1759  the  Essaisur  le  Beau  of  Pere  Andre  was  edited 
at  Amsterdam,  with  a  Discours  preliminaire  et  des  Re- 
flexions sur  le  Gout,  by  J.  H.  B.  Formey.  It  is  a  vindica- 
tion of  a  power  in  man  to  rise  above  the  impressions 
of  sense,  and  reach  universal  and  axiomatic  ideas.  He 
explains  the  diversity  which  exists  both  in  matters  of  taste 
and  of  conduct,  as  due  to  climate,  education,  and  pre- 
judice, but  affirms  that  this  does  not  weaken  the  force  of 
universal  ideas,  which  are  demonstrable  as  principles.  He 
eulogises  Andre's  Essai,  criticises  Crousaz's  distinction  of 
absolute  and  relative  Beauty,  and  combats  the  position  of 
the  Encyclopedists.  He  then  gives  it  as  his  own  opinion 
that  Beauty  consists  in  the  perception  of  rapports  : — "  La 
perception  des  rapports  est  done  le  fondement  du  Beau  "  ; 
and  continues  —  "  il  semble  que  nous  considdrons  alors  les 
etres  non  seulement  en  eux-memes,  mais  encore  relativement 
aux  lieux  qu'ils  occupent  dans  la  Nature,  dans  le  Tout." 

The  experiential  rather  than  the  ideal  philosophy  was, 
however,  at  this  time  in  the  ascendant  in  France.  In 
1759)  D'Alembert  read  to  the  French  Academy  some 
Reflexions  sur  Vusage  et  sur  fabus  de  la  Philosophic  dans 
les  matieres  de  gout.  It  was  a  string  of  rhetorical  common- 
places. He  did  not  affirm  the  complete  arbitrariness  of  taste. 
There  were  certain  kinds  of  Beauty  which  appealed  to  all ; 
others  which  only  appealed  to  the  connoisseur ;  but  taste 
was  founded  on  fixed  principles  within  ourselves.  We  can- 
not attain  to  any  first  principles  regarding  it,  but  we  can 
reach,  and  may  do  very  well  with,  certain  secondary  ones. 
That  was  the  outcome  of  D'Alembert's  "  reflections." 

Taste,  he  affirmed,  is  widespread  though  not  universal. 
There  are  beauties  so  sublime  and  striking  that  all  minds  feel 
them  equally,  in  all  centuries  and  in  all  countries.  But  besides 
this  kind  of  beauty  there  is  a  species  of  a  second  order,  which 
requires  even  more  sagacity  to  discern  and  more  delicacy  to 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  1 03 

feel.  This  beauty  is  found  most  in  nations  where  social 
intercourse  has  perfected  the  arts,  and  it  is  this  beauty  that  is 
properly  the  object  of  Taste.  D'Alembert  defines  Taste  then 
as  "  le  talent  de  demeler  dans  les  ouvrages  de  1'art  ce  qui 
doit  plaire  aux  ames  sensibles,  et  ce  qui  doit  les  blesser." 
Taste  is  not  arbitrary,  but  is  founded  on  fixed  principles. 
The  source  of  our  pleasure  or  our  ennui  lies  only  and  solely 
in  ourselves  ;  and  in  ourselves  we  find  the  invariable  rules  of 
taste,  which  serve  as  a  touchstone  to  test  all  productions  of 
art  submitted  to  us.  Pursuing  our  investigation  in  a  philo- 
sophical spirit,  however,  we  find  a  limit  which  we  cannot 
pass.  To  first  principles  we  cannot  ascend  ;  these  are  for 
ever  hidden  behind  a  cloud.  To  seek  to  understand  the 
metaphysical  cause  of  our  pleasure  would  be  a  quest  as 
hopeless  as  to  seek  to  explain  the  action  of  objects  on  our 
senses.  But,  as  the  origin  of  our  knowledge  can  be  reduced 
to  a  small  number  of  sensations,  so  the  source  of  our  pleasure 
in  matters  of  taste  can  be  traced  to  the  way  in  which  we  feel. 

In  the  same  year  as  Batteux's  Cours  de  Belles-Letlres 
appeared  (176  5),  Voltaire's  Philosophical  Dictionary  was  pub- 
lished. It  contained  a  brief  article  on  the  Beautiful,  stating 
the  ordinary  conventional  arguments  against  a  standard  of 
taste,  founded  simply  on  the  diverse  verdicts  of  individuals 
and  races.  It  has  no  philosophical  value.  The  curious 
thing,  however,  is  that  Voltaire  also  contributed  the  article 
"  Gout "  to  the  French  Encyclopedic  ou  Dictionnaire  Raisonne 
des  Sciences,  des  Arts  et  des  Metiers  of  Diderot  and 
D'Alembert  (1751-1772);  and  in  it  he  admits  a  standard, 
which  in  his  own  Philosophical  Dictionary  he  denies. 

He  says  that  by  a  metaphor  drawn  from  the  physical 
world  Taste  is  the  sense  by  which  we  discern  beauty  and  its 
opposite  in  all  the  arts  ;  and  this  metaphoric  taste  follows 
the  same  laws  as  physical  taste  does.  Like  that  of  the 
tongue  and  palate,  it  even  anticipates  reflection,  is  sensitive 
to  what  is  good,  and  rejects  the  bad  with  indignation.  It 
is  often,  however,  uncertain  and  roving.  It  is  not  sufficient 
for  Taste  to  see  and  to  know  the  beauty  of  a  work,  it 
must  feel  it,  be  touched  by  it,  distinguish  its  "nuances." 
Depraved  taste  in  art  selects  revolting  subjects,  or  prefers 


104  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

•the  burlesque  to  the  noble,  the  affected  to  the  natural 
and  simple,  and  is  a  malady  of  the  spirit.  As  with  the 
individual,  so,  little  by  little,  taste  forms  in  nations,  as  the 
spirit  of  the  great  artists  is  apprehended.  The  saying 
that  one  cannot  dispute  about  matters  of  taste  applies 
only  on  the  physical  side.  It  is  not  so  in  Art.  There 
is  a  good  taste  that  discerns,  and  a  bad  taste  that  ignores. 
"  II  y  a  aussi  des  ames  froides  et  des  esprits  faux,  qu'on 
ne  peut  ni  ^chauffer  ni  redresser ;  c'est  avec  eux  qu'il 
ne  faut  point  disputer  parce  qu'ils  n'en  ont  aucun."  Taste, 
however,  may  b£  lost  to  a  nation.  This  most  frequently 
occurs  after  a  period  of  perfection.  Artists,  fearing  to 
imitate,  go  too  far  afield,  and  lose  the  beauty  of  Nature 
that  their  predecessors  seized.  There  are  whole  countries 
which  a  genuine  taste  has  never  entered.  It  is  also  seen 
that  where  some  of  the  Arts  are  wanting,  the  rest  can  rarely 
flourish,  because  all  adhere,  and  depend  the  one  upon  the 
other.  This  is  the  substance  of  the  teaching  of  Voltaire. 

During  the  greater  part  of  the  eighteenth  century  both 
French  criticism  and  French  Art  were  altogether  conven- 
tional. Much  of  the  former  appeared  in  the  Notes  of  travel 
in  Italy,  which  were  taken  down  by  the  artists  in  the  course 
of  their  wanderings,  but  which  were  written  without  any 
insight.  This  conventionality  is  well  put  by  Mr.  Morley — a 
writer  certainly  not  biassed  against  the  dominant  note  of 
the  century — in  his  Diderot : — 

"  Of  course  the  artists  went  to  Rome,  but  they  changed  sky  and 
not  spirit.  The  pupils  of  the  Academy  came  back  with  their  port- 
folios filled  with  sketches,  in  which  we  see  nothing  of  the  '  true 
mother  of  dead  empires, '  nothing  of  the  vast  ruins,  and  the  great 
sombre  desolate  Campagna,  but  only  Rome  turned  into  a  decora- 
tion for  the  scenes  of  a  theatre,  or  the  panels  of  a  boudoir. "  * 

The  mention  of  Diderot's  name  brings  us  to  one  who 
had  perhaps  the  most  powerful  brain  amongst  the  French 
Encyclopedists.  Diderot  wrote  the  encyclopedia  article  on 
the  Beautiful.  Though  his  theory  was  a  very  incomplete 

1  Diderot,  vol.  ii.  p.  71. 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  105 

one,  his  criticisms  were  admirably  incisive.  His  papers  on 
the  successive  Salons,  though  desultory  and  unsystematic — 
and  they  could  not  help  being  so — were  scientifically  far  in 
advance  of  their  time  ;  now  and  then  they  rose  to  a  rank 
which  makes  them  even  models  of  art-criticism.  Diderot 
was  much  more  successful  as  an  art-critic  than  as  a  specu- 
lative philosopher.  His  essay  on  Painting  was  written  in 
1765,  though  not  published  till  1796.  Goethe,  writing  to 
Schiller,  called  it  "  a  magnificent  work,"  and  he  translated 
part  of  it.  In  intellectual  philosophy  he  was  a  necessi- 
tarian ;  and,  discarding  the  ideal,  his  one  recipe  for  good 
art  was  simply  "go  back  to  Nature" — the  /xi^cris  of 
Aristotle.  He  could  not  understand  the  Platonic  idealisa- 
tion, but  would  cure  the  conventionality  and  mannerisms 
of  bad  Art  by  faithful  imitation,  by  copying  the  real.  And 
what  we  would  not  expect  in  this  connection,  he  con- 
demned the  practice  of  painting  from  models  as  artificial. 
He  saw  that  the  stiff  attitudinising  model,  the  posing 
figure,  was  not  a  piece  of  living,  breathing,  changing 
Nature,  and  condemned  it  accordingly.  But  Diderot 
forgot  (i)  that  the  most  perfect  products  of  Art  cannot 
possibly  be  reproductions  of  movement,  but  only  of  that 
which  once  moved,  and  which  has  therefore  the  latent 
capabilities  of  movement ;  (2)  that  the  study  of  moving 
objects,  as  they  are  seen  in  Nature,  and  not  as  they  would 
be  isolated  for  the  purpose  of  copying,  would  only  result 
in  blurred  effects,  confusion  of  detail,  with  no  harmony 
either  of  form  or  of  colour  ;  (3)  that  Art  cannot  imitate 
Nature  exactly,  simply  because  Nature  is  always  changing. 
We  may  fix  some  one  single  shape  or  group  of  shapes, 
some  one  assemblage  of  colours  or  groups  of  colours  ;  but, 
in  all  high  Art,  these  are  meant  to  suggest  much  more  than 
they  can  express  or  record. 

In  his  essay  on  the  Beautiful  in  the  Encycloptdie[ 
Diderot  searches  for  an  explanation  of  the  origin  of  the; 
Beautiful,  and  in  the  course  of  it  he  deals  with  Hutcheson's 
theory.  His  solution  that  Beauty  lies  "  in  relation  "  is  very 
inadequate.  "  Beau  est  un  terme  que  nous  appliquons  a 
une  infinitd  d'etres  .  .  .  dans  tous  ces  etres  une  qualite  dont 


io6  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

le  terme  beau  soit  le  signe."  T  It  is  too  abstract,  bare,  and 
therefore  too  sterile  a  conception.  The  relations  which  make 
certain  objects  beautiful,  and  others  not — and  which  make 
the  same  object  beautiful  and  ugly  at  different  times — have 
still  to  be  examined.  Diderot  is  more  successful  in  his 
attempt  to  map  out  the  sections  and  sub-sections  of  Art, 
than  he  is  in  his  theory  of  Beauty.  When  we  raise  the 
question,  How  do  the  poet,  painter,  sculptor,  and  musician 
co-operate  ?  and  how  do  they  differ,  in  dealing  with  their 
common  element,  Beauty  ?  in  this  scientific  quest  we  may 
find  Diderot  suggestive,  if  not  directly  helpful. 

Another  thing  may  be  noted.  He  was  more  indebted 
than  he  knew  to  the  philosophy  which  he  discarded.  Here 
is  one  idealistic  hint  which,  had  he  followed  it  out,  might 
have  led  him  a  certain  distance  towards  the  theory  opposite 
to  that  which  he  espoused,  or  at  least  out  of  the  ruts  of  his 
own  literalism.  "True  taste,"  he  said,  "fastens  on  one 
or  two  characteristics,  and  leaves  the  rest  to  the  imagination. 
...  If  an  artist  shows  us  everything,  and  leaves  us  nothing 
to  do,  he  leaves  us  weary  and  impatient."  So  much  for 
Diderot. 

4.  Montesquieu  to  Cousin 

A  fragment  on  "Taste,"  by  Montesquieu  (1689-1755), 
the  author  of  L'Esprit  des  Lois,  was  discovered  amongst 
his  papers  after  his  death,  and  inserted  in  the  French 
Encyclopedic  by  Diderot.  He  held  that  the  arguments  of 
Plato  are  no  longer  tenable,  founded  as  they  are  on  a  false 
philosophy.  These  arguments  treat  of  the  good,  beautiful, 
perfect,  wise,  as  positive  things.  The  sources  of  the 
beautiful  are  in  ourselves,  and  in  seeking  the  reason  of 
them  we  seek  the  sources  of  pleasure.  Poetry,  Painting, 
Sculpture,  Music,  Architecture,  all  give  pleasure ;  let  us 
discover  why,  how,  and  when.  This  will  aid  us  to  form 
Taste,  which  is  nothing  but  the  power  of  discerning  with 
delicacy  (finesse),  and  with  promptitude,  the  amount  of 

1  See  also  his  Lettre  sur  les  Sourds  et  Muets  : — "  Le  goftt  en 
ge"ne"ral  consiste  dans  la  perception  des  rapports." 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  107 

pleasure  they  can  give  to  mankind.  The  soul,  inde- 
pendently of  the  pleasures  that  come  through  the  senses, 
has  those  which  are  proper  to  it.  It  is  immaterial  to  con- 
sider whether  our  soul  has  these  pleasures  as  a  substance 
united  with  a  body,  or  as  separate  from  the  body ;  the  soul 
has  them  always,  and  these  are  the  objects  of  Taste.  The 
manner  of  our  seeing  is  entirely  arbitrary  ;  we  might  have 
been  made  differently,  in  which  case  we  should  have  felt 
differently.  It  follows  that  were  we  different,  art  would 
have  been  different.  After  referring  to  the  love  both  of 
order  and  variety,  he  pauses  to  criticise  Gothic  buildings, 
the  ornamentation  of  which  he  thinks  too  varied.  "  Gothic 
buildings  are  an  enigma,  confusing  the  eye,  and  em- 
barrassing the  mind."  He  compares  them  with  the  Greek, 
of  which  he  praises  the  simplicity — few  diversions,  and  those 
dignified  and  grand.  He  then  lays  down  the  law  that  what- 
ever we  see  at  one  moment  should  have  symmetry ;  what 
we  see  in  succession,  variety.  "  Les  choses  que  nous 
voyons  successivement  doivent  avoir  de  la  varidte ;  car 
notre  ame  n'a  aucune  difficulte  a  les  voir  ;  celles  au  con- 
traire  que  nous  apercevons  d'un  coup  d'ceil  doivent  avoir 
de  la  symetrie."  He  then  emphasises  the  necessity  of 
contrast — (all  things  fatigue  us  in  the  long-run,  even  great 
pleasures) — of  sensibility,  delicacy ;  and  so  comes  to  the 
"  je  ne  sais  quoi."  This,  he  says,  is  founded  on  a  feeling  of 
surprise.  "  A  source  of  great  beauty  is  when  a  theory  in- 
spires us  at  first  with  a  slight  feeling  of  surprise  ;  this  feeling 
is  sustained  and  augmented ;  it  is  finally  followed  by 
admiration."  Many  painters  seize  our  imagination  at  once, 
with  an  extraordinary  expression,  bizarre  attitude,  or  gor- 
geous colour.  In  the  case  of  others,  as  Raphael,  the  beauty 
intensifies  after  a  time.  Similarly,  the  exact  proportion  of 
St.  Peter's  at  Rome  is  such  that  at  first  we  do  not  appre- 
hend its  greatness.  Were  it  less  wide,  we  should  feel  its 
length  ;  were  it  shorter,  we  should  perceive  its  breadth. 
But,  after  a  while,  the  more  one  gazes,  the  more  its  great- 
ness seems  to  grow. 

Many  of  the  shorter  articles  in  the  Encyclopedic  were 
written  by  Jean  Francois  Marmontel  (1723-1799),  drama- 


io8  The  Philosophy  of  tJie  Beautiful          CHAP. 

tist,  member  of  the  French  Academy  and  its  secretary, 
editor  of  the  Mercure,  Historiographer  of  France,  etc.  ;  and 
in  those  which  dealt  with  the  principles  of  literary  art — 
he  himself  published  a  work,  Elements  de  Litterature 
(1787) — he  followed  in  the  footsteps  of  his  chief.  He  was 
a  slavish  disciple  of  Racine,  Boileau,  etc.  Tied  to  the  literary 
precedents  of  the  French  orthodoxy  of  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury, and  having  no  sympathetic  vision  beyond  it,  Marmontel,( 
with  La  Harpe  and  all  his  collaborateurs,  was  a  very  clear 
and  very  clever  but  a  singularly  dry  writer,  and  to  those 
who  could  see  other  horizons  a  very  dull  critic.  "  Les 
trois  qualites  distinctives  du  beau,"  said  he,  "  sont  la  force, 
la  richesse,  et  1'intelligence " — a  statement  which  Topffer 
calls  "  une  definition  manquee." 

There  was  no  profound  discussion  of  the  subject  of 
Beauty,  either  in  France  or  in  England,  throughout  the 
whole  of  the  eighteenth  century  ;  and  the  explanation  is  not 
difficult  to  find.  The  experience-philosophy,  then  domi- 
nant in  Europe,  discredited  the  beautiful,  both  by  subordi- 
nating it  to  utilitarian  interests,  and  by  explaining  its  origin 
as  sense-born. 

It  is  impossible,  and  in  this  work  it  is  quite  unnecessary, 
to  explain  the  causes — or  rather  the  many  co-operating 
causes — which  led  to  the  rise  of  the  opposite  philosophy 
in  the  nineteenth  century.  Suffice  it  to  say  that  the  great 
literary  renaissance  helped  the  philosophical  one,  and  the 
philosophical  revival  in  Germany — the  speculative  move- 
ment of  which  Kant  was  the  earliest  representative — reacted 
both  on  French  philosophy  and  French  aesthetic. 

In  the  year  1801  the  Institute  of  France  offered  a  prize 
for  the  best  solution  of  the  problem,  What  are  the  causes  of 
the  perfection  of  Ancient  Sculpture,  and  what  would  be  the 
best  means  of  attaining  it  ?  The  prize  was  gained  by  T.  B. 
Emeric-David  (1755-1825).  The  full  title  of  his  memoir 
— the  prize  for  which  was  awarded  in  1801,  and  the  book 
itself  published  (in  544  pages)  in  1805 — was  Recherches  sur 
Part  statuaire,  considere  chez  les  antiens  et  chez  les  modernes^ 
ou  memoire  stir  cette  question  proposee  par  PInstitut  Na- 
tional de  France;  quelles  ont  ete  les  causes  de  la  proportion 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  109 

de  la  Sculpture  antique,  et  quelles  seraient  les  moyens  tfy 
attaindre?  His  thesis  was  a  defence  of  the  Aristotelian 
dogma  that  the  imitation  of  Nature,  the  careful  study  of 
fact,  of  real  beauty  existing  in  Greece,  brought  the  art  of 
the  age  of  Pericles  to  its  rare  perfection. 

A  contemporary  of  his,  A.  C.  Quatremere  de  Quincey, 
(1755-1849),  took  the  opposite,  or  the  Platonic  view,  viz. 
that  the  ancient  artists  did  not  copy  Nature,  but  an  ideal  of 
perfection,  which  the  actual  world  did  not  supply.  He  was 
perpetual  secretary  of  the  Academic  Royale  des  Beaux-Arts, 
architect,  sculptor,  and  member  of  the  French  Institute, 
was  a  voluminous  writer  on  art,  chiefly  in  the  form  of  papers 
read  to  the  Academic,  and  published  under  the  title  Discours, 
The  following  is  a  resume  of  one  of  these  essays,  "  De  Funi- 
versalite  du  Beau,  et  de  la  maniere  de  F  entendre"  bound  in 
a  volume  of  Discours  prononces  a  FInstitut : — Certain  truths 
are  invariable  and  universal.  Such  are  the  ideas  of  the 
true  and  the  good,  of  which  Beauty  is  one  of  the  tangible 
forms.  But  taste  and  opinions  on  the  beautiful  differ  in 
different  nations  and  times.  How  then  can  it  be  universal  ? 
Either  there  is  a  standard  of  Beauty  that  can  be  recog- 
nised as  such,  and  therefore  it  is  absurd  to  extend  it  to  all 
works  alike  ;  or  there  is  not  such  a  standard,  and  no  one 
has  the  right  to  praise  or  blame  anything.  The  test,  how- 
ever, is  to  be  found  in  the  knowledge  or  the  ignorance  of 
the  individual,  or  the  nation.  Even  the  True  and  the 
Good  are  not  recognised  as  such  by  all ;  so  with  the  Beauti- 
ful. It  is  a  false  argument  that  because  a  number  of  people 
do  not  admit  the  truth  of  an  experience  or  a  calculation, 
therefore  it  is  not  true.  Moral  truths  are  obscured  by 
ignorance,  and  brutal  passion  ;  yet  are  they  none  the  less 
universal,  or  have  the  inherent  power  of  becoming  so.  The  ] 
least  analysis  shows  that  the  Beautiful  is  composed  of  a 
principle  of  unity  allied  to  variety,  a  principle  of  order  and 
harmony,  truth  and  utility — qualities  which  can  be  appre- 
ciated in  theory,  and  applied  in  practice  only  by  the  union 
of  reason,  intelligence,  imagination,  and  feeling  ;  faculties 
existing  in  all  men,  but  which  are  in  the  greater  number 
inert.  In  vegetable  life,  do  not  all  agree  that  a  well-  « 


no  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

developed  tree  is  more  beautiful  than  a  stunted  one  ?     So 
with  regard  to  certain  races  of  men,  forms  of  bodies,  etc. 

The  universality  of  the  Beautiful  then  is  to  be  under- 
stood, not  in  a  material  or  arithmetical  sense,  but  in  a 
moral  and  intellectual  one.  We  call  human  reason,  not 
what  one  particular  individual  thinks,  but  the  opinion  of 
the  aggregate  intelligence.  Undeveloped  faculties  cannot 
distinguish  between  the  good  and  the  bad,  the  true  and 
the  false,  nor  can  they  apprehend  the  idea  of  the  Beautiful 
or  discern  its  principles.  We  find  that  people,  arrived  at 
the  same  degree  of  civilisation,  are  in  accord  in  their 
opinions,  sentiments,  and  judgments  on  the  Beautiful,  its 
idea  and  principle.  Thus  it  is  universal,  not  because  it  is 
seen  and  known  of  all,  but  because  those  who  have  eyes 
to  see,  see  it ;  not  because  it  exists  in  all  works,  but  because 
wherever  it  exists,  and  we  recognise  it,  it  has  the  power  of 
pleasing  all  cultivated  minds,  who  are  able  to  understand  the 
laws  of  nature.  Not  that  it  accords  with  the  taste  of  each 
particular  man,  but  because  it  accords  with  the  nature  of 
man  in  general.  If  instead  of  this  we  uphold  the  com- 
plaisant doctrine,  that  that  which  pleases,  at  any  time  and 
place,  is  beautiful !  one  sees  that  each  artist  may  form 
rules  for  himself.  One  would  find  artists  revolving  in 
endless  circles  of  variation,  embracing  sometimes  the  evil 
and  sometimes  the  good,  abjuring  truths  once  apprehended, 
and  returning  to  errors  once  rejected  by  themselves. 

Elsewhere,  Quatremere  de  Quincey  puts  the  root-prin- 

)ciple  of  idealism  thus:  "In  every  Art,  that  which  comes 
within  the  range  of  the  understanding,  sentiment,  and  genius 
does  not  really  exist  anywhere.  It  has  neither  substance 
nor  place.  It  is  subject  to  none  of  the  senses,  and  he 

)  who  has  found  it  cannot  tell  where  he  has  seen  its  model." 
Perhaps  the  most  noteworthy  fact  to  be  mentioned  at 
this  stage,  as  bearing  on  the  future  course  of  opinion  in 
France,  is  the  avidity  with  which  the  younger  race  of 
Frenchmen,  at  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century,  read 
the  works  of  the  German  metaphysicians,  and  imbibed  the 
best  parts  of  their  teaching.  Out  of  sheer  despair  at  the 
philosophical  "  slough  of  despond,"  or  the  pit  of  nescience 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  1 1 1 

into  which  their  countrymen  had  been  swept  by  the  wave 
of  the  "enlightenment,"  they  turned  to  the  literature  of 
other  lands  ;  and  by  the  help  of  the  works  of  German  and 
of  Scottish  philosophers,  they  essayed  a  new  reading  of  the 
facts  of  external  Nature  and  of  the  human  consciousness. 
It  is  certain  that  most  of  the  yoimg  French  students  of 
Philosophy  at  the  beginning  of  the  century  looked  for 
help,  not  to  their  own  Encyclopedists — the  clever  scientific 
thinkers  of  the  brilliant  era  of  Voltaire — but  to  the  meta- 
physicians of  Germany.  It  is  also  to  be  noted  that  very 
many  of  them  wrote  essays  or  papers  on  the  subject  of  the 
Beautiful.  Leveque  tells  us  *  that,  in  the  half-century  from 
1 8 10  to  1864,  thirty  of  the  docteurs  es  lettres  in  France 
selected  the  question  of  ./Esthetic  as  the  subject  of  their 
graduation  thesis.  This  was  due  not  merely  to  the  interest 
which  Cousin  and  Jouffroy  had  stirred  up,  but  also  to  a  study 
of  Kant  and  Schelling,  of  Winckelmann  and  Schiller. 

It  is  somewhat  curious  that  in  the  voluminous  work  of 
Comte — the  Bacon  of  France — we  have  almost  no  discussion 
of  this  subject.  In  the  fifth  volume  of  the  Philosophic 
Positive,  pp.  47-49  and  pp.  104-161,  and  in  the  sixth 
volume,  p.  158,  some  indirect  discussion  of  it  will  be  found. 
Comte  thought  that  the  personification  of  Nature  in  the  early 
polytheism  was  favourable  to  Art ;  while  the  monotheistic 
conception  of  the  universe  was  at  first  unfavourable  to  it. 

In  1813,  Victor  Cousin,  then  a  pupil  of  Royer-Collard 
at  the  Sorbonne,  caught  the  spirit  of  the  anti-sensationalist 
doctrine  which  that  pioneer  had  the  courage  to  unfold.  In 
1815,  as  his  successor  in  the  Chair  of  Philosophy,  Cousin 
led  the  van  of  the  new  idealistic  movement  in  France.  As 
soon  as  it  took  definite  shape,  that  movement  was  carica- 
tured, and  its  advocates  were  lampooned  as  eclectics.  Its 
noblest  moral  feature,  and  its  most  characteristic  outcome, 
were  made  its  intellectual  pivot  by  its  opponents,  and  as 
such  ridiculed.  It  was  an  easy  but  a  foolish  task.  It  is 
true  that  in  Cousin  a  single  philosophical  thought  is 
sometimes  hammered  on  the  anvil  so  long,  that  it  is  beaten 
too  thin  and  fine  ;  and  now  and  then  (though  not  so  often 
1  La  Science  du  Beau  (preface,  p.  ix. ). 


ii2  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

as  his  detractors  allege)  the  thought  is  lost  in  rhetoric  ;  but 
the  sterling  merits  of  the  philosophical  revival,  in  which  he 
bore  a  distinguished  part,  will  be  increasingly  appreciated 
as  the  history  of  opinion  on  this  subject  is  better  known. 
,  In  his  first  course  of  Lectures  at  the  Sorbonne — from 
11815  to  1820 — Cousin  contented  himself  with  showing  that 
the  Beautiful  could  not  be  the  merely  agreeable  or  pleasant, 
either  in  a  lower  or  a  more  refined  sense  ;  and  that  the 
dicta  of  the  masses  could  determine  nothing  as  to  what 
Beauty  intrinsically  is.  When  he  passed',  however,  from 
the  mere  criticism  of  inadequate  and  partial  theories,  to 
announce  another  of  his  own,  he  fell  back  on  the  old  and 
equally  one-sided  doctrine  that  Beauty  consists  in  unity  and 
variety.  The  unsatisfactory  vagueness  of  this  old  August- 
inian  doctrine  is  apparent.  It  is  quite  true  that  variety 
with  no  unity  is  not  only  distracting,  but  unintelligible, 
just  as  unity  without  variety  is  not  only  monotonous,  but 
unmeaning.  But  the  mere  statement  that  these  two  things, 
unity  and  variety,  are  equally  important  elements  in  Beauty, 
solves  nothing.  We  see  unity  and  variety  in  almost  every- 
thing, but  what  the  better  are  we  for  the  sight  of  them,  so 
far  as  a  theory  of  aesthetic  is  concerned  ? 

Cousin's  is  a  very  partial  key  to  the  mystery  of  the 
problem.  He  is  much  less  successful  in  philosophical 
construction,  than  in  the  literary  criticism  of  inadequate 
theories.  With  incisive  force  he  shows  the  inadequacy  of  the 
Aristotelian  doctrine  that  Art  lies  in  the  imitation  of  Nature  ; 
but  he  falls  back  somewhat  helplessly  on  the  solution  of 
St.  Augustine  in  the  De  Apto  et  Pulchro^  and  his  reduction 
of  all  physical  and  intellectual  to  moral  beauty  is  very  one- 
sided. It  is  surely  not  even  in  keeping  with  the  funda- 
mental rule  of  the  Eclectic  that  physical  Beauty  is  attractive 
only  because  it  is  a  mirror  of  the  spiritual  that  underlies  it. 
Cousin's  was  a  useful  protest  against  current  theories  that 
faced  the  other  way — and  to  glorify  Art  as  one  of  the  means 
that  (as  Browning  puts  it)  "  bring  the  invisible  full  into 
play,"  is  always  serviceable — but  it  was  really  little  more 
than  a  revival  of  the  Neoplatonic  doctrine. 

In  1816,  M.  Guizot  (1787-1874)  wrote  an  Essai  sur  les 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  113 

limites  qui  separent^  et  les  liens  qui  unissent  les  beaux  Arts. 
Reference  to  this  essay  will  be  made,  in  a  subsequent 
volume,  in  the  section  which  deals  with  Sculpture.  It 
contains  no  profound  analysis  of  the  nature  of  the  Beautiful, 
and  a  good  deal  of  that  vain  repetition  of  truisms  in  a  lucid 
style,  of  which  many  French  writers  are  masters.  Never- 
theless there  is  wisdom  in  many  of  Guizot's  incidental 
remarks,  e.g.  sculpture,  by  reason  of  the  material  in  which 
it  works,  can  only  deal  with  states  of  mind  or  of  body,  both 
of  which  states  must  be  beautiful ;  whereas  painting,  with 
the  help  it  receives  from  colour,  and  the  rapidity  with  which 
it  can  embody  an  inspiration,  may  represent  emotion  and 
action,  whether  simple  or  complicated,  without  any  sacrifice 
of  beauty. 

5.  Lamennais  to  Jouffroy 

A  work  of  great,  though  subsidiary,  value,  as  bearing 
on  ^-Esthetics,  was  first  published  in  Paris  in  the  year  1835, 
viz.  The  Principles  of  Harmony  and  Contrast  in  Colours^  and 
their  application  to  the  Arts,  by  M.  E.  Chevreul.  This 
was  the  result,  as  its  author  tells  us,  of  researches  on  the 
simultaneous  contrast  of  colours,  pursued  for  many  years,  and 
especially  since  1828.  He  professes  to  have  demonstrated 
the  law  of  colours,  by  experiment,  a  posteriori.  It  is  a  standard 
treatise  on  the  subject  of  colour,  but  it  falls  rather  within 
the  literature  of  Fine  Art  than  the  history  of  Esthetics. 

The  Esquisse  d'une  Philosophic  of  F.  R.  de  Lamennais 
(1782-1854)  was  published  in  1841.  In  this  book  (so  far 
as  there  is  any  philosophy  in  it)  mysticism  excludes  both 
reason  and  experience.  It  is  of  no  philosophical  signifi- 
cance, but  it  contains  some  interesting  reflections  on  the 
historical  progress  of  the  Arts.  Lamennais  was  of  an  erratic 
and  somewhat  eccentric  temperament.  He  began  as  a 
liberal  catholic,  and  ended  as  an  almost  agnostic  democrat. 
His  literary  work  was  vague  and  incomplete,  unsystematic 
to  the  last  degree,  though  with  occasional  insight,  and 
abounding  in  detached  felicities  of  phrase. 

Just  as  Cousin  drank  inspiration  from  Royer-Collard,  a 
I 


ii4  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

young  auditor  of  Cousin's  lectures  caught  the  spirit  of  his 
idealism  and  developed  it  further.  Emile  Saisset1  gives 
us  an  interesting  account  of  this  youth  from  the  Jura 
mountains,  with  "  mild  and  melancholy  face " — poet  as 
well  as  thinker — listening  to  the  teaching  of  Cousin.  He 
was  one  of  those  who  took  for  the  subject  of  his  Doctor's 
thesis  "  the  emotion  of  the  Beautiful."  This  youth,  Theodore 
Jouffroy  (i  796-1 842),  succeeded  Cousin  in  the  Chair  of  Philo- 
sophy at  the  Sorbonne,  but  was  dismissed  from  it  in  1822 
(the  school  being  suppressed).  He  then  gathered  round 
him  about  a  score  of  friends  in  a  private  house,  where  he 
lectured  to  them.  "  This  little  chamber  of  the  Rue  du  Four," 
says  Saisset,  "  has  a  place  in  history."  One  of  the  audience, 
Sainte-Beuve,  gives  a  brilliant  picture  of  the  weekly  lectures.2 
To  a  small  but  appreciative  audience  Jouffroy  delivered  forty 
lectures,  which,  however,  he  did  not  write  out.  Notes  of 
them  were  taken  by  M.  de  Lorme.  These  were  revised  by 
Jouffroy,  and  after  his  death  they  were  edited  by  M.  Damiron. 
This  Cours  d'Esthetique  (1843)  is  an  admirable  work, 
not  facile,  with  no  surface  platitude,  or  showy  epigram, 
(which  is  the  occasional  bane  of  French  philosophy),  but 
with  real  merit  of  a  solid  kind,  perhaps  with  just  a  trifle 
too  much  confidence  that  it  is  invariably  carrying  us  along 
the  right  lines.  One  great  merit  in  the  work  is  the  dis- 
tinction drawn  between  the  science  and  the  philosophy  of 
the  Beautiful.  Jouffroy  begins  with  the  science,  i.e.  with 
the  discussion  of  the  psychological  question  of  Beauty  as  a 
fact  or  phenomenon  in  the  mind  of  man  and  in  Nature,  in 
order  that  he  may  the  more  successfully  pass  thence  to  the 
philosophical  or  metaphysical  problem  of  the  essence  of 
Beauty.  When  the  question  was  raised,  What  is  it  that 
makes  an  object  beautiful  ?  the  metaphysical  method  of 
dealing  with  it  was  to  bring  together  a  number  of  things, 
each  separately  beautiful,  and  to  try  to  take  from  them 
their  common  characteristic.  If  this  could  be  withdrawn 
(removed  by  analysis),  it  was  thought  that  in  and  by  the 

1  In  his  L'Ame  et  la  Vie,  suivi  d'un  examen  critique  de  I'  Esthttique 
franfaise  (pp.  98-100). 

2  In  his  Portraits  Litttraires  (vol.  i.  p.  320). 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  115 

separation  we  might  find  the  ultimate  principle,  the  inner 
secret,  or  speculative  kernel  of  Beauty.  A  much  surer 
method  of  procedure  is  to  start  psychologically.  Jouffroy 
thought  we  should  begin  by  asking  what  it  is  in  each 
separate  thing  that  leads  us  to  call  it  beautiful ;  and  in 
what  relation  does  each  separately  beautiful  thing  stand  to 
us  who  perceive  and  know  it  ?  First  of  all  he  notes  the 
elementary  fact  that  all  objects  that  are  regarded  by  us  as 
beautiful,  or  that  awaken  the  emotion  of  beauty,  give 
pleasure.  Therefore,  he  says,  we  may  start  by  assuming 
that  the  emotion  of  pleasure  is  inseparable  from  our  recog- 
nition of  beauty.  That  fact,  however,  will  not  prove  that  the 
beautiful  and  the  agreeable  are  one.  A  psychological  fact  of 
some  importance  is  signalised  at  this  stage  of  the  discussion. 
It  is  that  in  proportion  as  objects,  recognised  as  beautiful, 
resemble  man,  or  in  so  far  as  they  mirror  our  humanity,  they 
are  to  that  extent  deemed  more  beautiful  by  us.  It  is  the 
grace  of  the  lily,  the  tenderness  of  the  colour  of  the  rose,  the 
peace  of  the  sky  at  sunset,  that  are  the  source  of  their  charm; 
but  grace,  tenderness,  and  peace  are  human  characteristics.  ' 
Jouffroy  next  shows  fully  and  very  clearly  the  difference 
between  the  beautiful  and  the  useful.  Much  that  is  beau- 
tiful is  not  useful,  and  much  that  is  useful  is  not  beautiful. 
Further,  in  realising  the  beauty  of  any  object,  we  ignore  its  { 
utility  for  the  time  being ;  and  vice  versd,  in  appreciating 
its  utility,  we  miss  its  beauty.  Another  psychological  fact 
of  importance  mentioned  by  Jouffroy  is  that,  whenever  we  i 
experience  an  emotion  of  the  beautiful,  we  desire  nearness, 
or  contact  with  the  object ;  but  that,  as  soon  as  we  possess 
it,  part  of  its  charm  begins  to  fade.  The  craving  for 
possession,  however,  is  no  part  of  the  original  feeling  we' 
have  for  any  object  that  we  recognise  as  beautiful.  If  our 
admiration  is  genuine,  it  is  disinterested.  It  is  respectful, 
even  reverential.  It  is  otherwise  when  we  desire  any 
object  for  its  use.  In  Jouffroy's  Cours  d> Esthetique  there 
is  an  ampler  criticism  than  in  Cousin's  Du  Vrai^  du  JSeau,  et 
du  Bien  of  the  inadequate  theories  that  find  the  origin  of 
Beauty  in  unity  and  variety,  in  utility  or  novelty,  in 
organised  experience  (or  custom),  and  in  association. 


n6  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

In  passing  from  the  psychology  to  the  metaphysics  of 
the  question,  and  trying  to  solve  the  problem  of  the  essence 
of  Beauty,  he  first  deals  critically  with  other  defective 
theories,  such  as  those  which  find  its  essence  in  order, 
proportion,  perfection,  harmony,  adjustment,  arrangement. 
What  do  all  these  theories  mean  ?  Simply  that  certain 
phenomena  are  related  to  one  another,  as  means  to  ends. 
But  all  phenomena  are  thus  adjusted  or  correlated,  and  the 
fact  of  their  adjustment  and  correlation  has  nothing  to  do 
either  with  the  beauty  or  the  ugliness  of  the  phenomena 
that  are  correlated.  What  makes  each  correlated  thing 
beautiful  has  yet  to  be  found.  Is  it  not,  he  goes  on  to 
say — and  here  we  reach  the  speciality  of  his  theory — is 
it  not  that  each  phenomenon  speaks  to  us,  as  by  symbol  or 
allegory,  that  it  shadows  forth  what  it  does  not  fully  dis 
close,  and  what  it  cannot  reveal  entirely  ?  In  proportion  as 
the  visible  hints  to  us  of  the  invisible,  the  corporeal  of  the 
incorporeal,  it  is  suffused  or  covered  over  with  the  raiment 
of  the  beautiful ;  and  we  now  reach  his  definition  of  Beauty, 
"  the  expression  of  the  Invisible  by  the  natural  signs  which 
manifest  it" ;  the  visible  world  is  the  "  garment  we  see  it  by." 

In  this  doctrine  Jouffroy  gives  us  a  synthesis  of  the 
realistic  and  idealistic  theories.  Starting  from  the  visible 
and  material,  it  transcends  them,  and  at  the  same  time 
keeps  close  to  nature  in  the  very  act  of  transcending  it. 
It  keeps  close  to  it  because  it  recognises  that  if  we  lose 
our  hold  of  the  actual  in  the  process  of  idealisation,  we 
will  probably  pass  into  a  region  of  haze  or  mere  cloudland. 
If,  on  the  other  hand,  we  never  transcend  the  actual,  we 
become  prosaic  literalists,  the  mere  slaves  of  fact. 

Reference  should  here  be  made  to  the  French  transla- 
tions and  commentaries  on  Kant's  Kritik  der  Urteilskraft. 
In  1796,  six  years  after  it  appeared  at  Konigsberg,  there 
was  published  at  Paris  Critique  du  Jugement  (observations 
sur  le  sentiment  du  beau  et  du  sublime),  translated  by 
Payer  Imhoff.  In  1823  a  second  translation  by  M.  Keratry 
was  preceded  by  a  long  introductory  commentary,  Examen 
philosophique  des  considerations  sur  le  sentiment  du  sublime  et 
du  beau  de  Kant.  In  the  same  year  M.  Weyland  published 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  117 

another  translation  under  the  title  Essai  sur  le  sentiment  du 
beau  et  du  sublime  ;  and  in  1846  Professor  Jules  Barni  pub- 
lished Critique  du  Jugement,  suivie  d^tn  Essai  sur  le  £eau, 
with  a  brief  introduction. 

6.  Swiss  writers;   Topffer  to  Cherbuliez 

At  this  stage  in  the  evolution  of  French  ^Esthetic  four 
Swiss  writers  should  be  referred  to.  They  are  all  interest- 
ing in  different  ways — Topffer,  Pictet,  Amiel,  and  Vinet. 

Rodolphe  Topffer,  a  philosophic  litterateur,  was  born  in 
Geneva  in  1790,  and  died  there  in  1846.  His  work  on 
^Esthetic  was  published  posthumously  in  1848,  with  a  short 
biographical  notice.  Topffer  was  a  sentimental  thinker, 
and  somewhat  fantastic,  deficient  in  logical  precision  ;  but 
his  book  is  full  of  insight  and  suggestiveness.  It  is  called 
Reflexions  et  Me?ius-Propos  d^un  Peintre  Genevois — ou 
Essai  sur  le  Beau  dans  les  arts.  Topffer  wages  war  against 
the  doctrine  that  imitation  of  nature  is  the  artist's  sole 
mission.  If  imitation  were  the  end  of  art,  then  the  highest 
end  art  could  attain  would  be  the  "  trompe  1'ceil."  This 
logical  deduction,  which  carries  absurdity  with  it,  shows 
the  falsity  of  the  principle.  The  slightest  sketch  of  a  clever 
painter  may  possess  more  artistic  merit  than  any  "  trompe 
1'ceil."  A  Claude  Lorrain  is  worth  all  the  dioramas  and 
panoramas  in  the  world.  The  true  artist  must  transform^ 
not  imitate.  From  this  Topffer  proceeds  to  lay  down  certain 
laws  of  Art.  He  passes  from  design,  colour,  etc.,  and  asks 
to  what  all  these  must  tend  ?  what  must  be  the  aim  of  the 
artist  ?  "  Ce  but,"  he  replies,  "  c'est  le  beau." 

"  The  Beauty  of  Art  proceeds  absolutely  and  solely  from 
human  thought,  freed  from  every  fetter,  save  that  of  mani- 
festing itself  by  the  representation  of  natural  objects " 
(Book  vi.  chap.  30).  He  then  discusses  the  theistic  side 
of  Beauty,  as  St.  Augustine,  Pere  Andre,  and  others  had 
done.  Beauty  proceeds  from  our  thought,  but  it  is  im- 
planted in  us  by  the  Infinite,  in  whom  all  Beauty  resides. 
Further,  he  says,  God  is  beauty,  and  ideas  of  beauty  in  us 
are  divine  attributes  there.  Topffer  held  that  beauty  in 


n8  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

art  was  wholly  different  from  beauty  in  nature,  being  inde- 
pendent and  superior.  The  beauty  we  conceive  is  absolute 
beauty.  This  being  admitted,  Art  has  two  things  it  must 
do.  It  must  conceive  the  beautiful,  and  embody  it.  To 
conceive  it,  one  must  be  endowed  with  the  faculty  for 
it,  must  clear  the  mind  of  prejudice,  give  free  play  to 
thought,  and  restrain  the  critical  instinct.  Then,  from 
the  union  of  the  creative  genius  which  conceives,  with  the 
talent  which  executes,  art  will  arise  in  its  most  perfect  form. 
Topffer  at  the  same  time  affirms  that  the  hand  of  man 
will  never  raise  the  veil  from  behind  which  the  "  generating 
principle  "  of  the  Beautiful  radiates  ;  and  in  reference  to  this, 
mystery  is  better  than  knowledge,  and  search  more  fruitful 
than  possession.  He  affirms  that  the  Beautiful — which  is 
the  splendour  of  the  True — is  the  absolute  essence  of  God. 

Adolphe  Pictet,  born  in  Geneva  in  1799,  was  a  soldier 
as  well  as  a  litterateur.  He  devoted  himself  chiefly  to  the 
study  of  language  and  of  art. 

In  his  Du  Beau,  dans  la  Nature,  VArt  et  la  Poesie  (1856) 
he  takes  exception  to  the  term  aesthetics  as  limited  in 
meaning,  preferring  the  phrase  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful. 
What  alone  interests  us,  he  says,  is  to  know  what  is  beauti- 
ful in  itself,  and  what  are  the  laws  of  its  development  in 
Art  and  Nature.  Without  concerning  himself  with  defini- 
tions or  philosophical  authorities,  Pictet  tries  to  read  the 
book  of  Nature  which  lies  open,  and  that  other  book, 
Humanity,  of  which  we  are  both  authors  and  readers  ;  the 
great  difference  between  these  two  books  being  that 
whereas  one — Nature — has  remained  unchanged  from  the 
beginning  of  Time,  the  other — Humanity — has  added,  from 
century  to  century,  new  ideas  and  new  expressions.  The 
one  presents  itself  as  an  invariable  manifestation  of  invari- 
able principles  ;  the  other  as  the  "  revelation  reflechie," 
"  comme  la  libre  creation  d'un  pouvoir  qui  se  sent,  qui  se 
possede,  et  qui  se  developpe  par  le  progres."  These  two 
books  cannot  be  considered  independently  of  each  other. 
Still,  Humanity  is  the  more  recent  document ;  and  there- 
fore we  must  first  read  the  book  of  Nature,  and  then  in 
our  search  for  the  beautiful  we  must  find  our  point  of 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  119 

departure  in  its  simplest  and  most  elementary  form. 
Pictet  considers  both  the  subjective  and  objective  theories 
of  Beauty  as  defective,  but  he  would  unite  them  from  a 
higher  point  of  view,  rather  than  sacrifice  the  one  to  the 
other.  He  dismisses  the  doctrine  of  utility.  On  that 
theory  the  interior  parts  of  all  organised  structures  would 
be  as  beautiful  as  the  exterior  ;  and  to  prove  how  little  the 
idea  of  Beauty  is  allied  to  that  of  utility,  causality,  and 
"  convenance,"  or  the  relation  of  means  to  ends,  he  says 
that  our  aesthetic  sense  is  shocked  by  some  organisms  which, 
from  a  utilitarian  point  of  view,  are  nevertheless  admirable. 
Beauty,  then,  before  all  things  "vent  paraitre,  se  montrer, 
briller,  etre  vu  " ;  it  is  essentially  phenomenon. 

Pictet  contests  the  notion  that  the  beauty  of  animals 
serves  any  purpose  to  the  animal  world.  //  M,  he  says, 
for  man  that  their  beauty  exists.  For  man  alone  beauty 
manifests  itself  in  external  nature.  His  recognition  of  it  is 
allied  to  a  power  of  reproducing  it,  and  thus  a  world  arises, 
of  which  beauty  is  the  unique  element.  This  world  is  Art. 

But  how  does  the  idea  manifest  itself  in  the  phenomena 
of  natural  beauty  ?  If  it  lies  in  the  manifestation  of  the 
idea  in  some  perceptible  form,  "  il  faut  ensuite  que  cette 
forme  n'exprime  absolument  autre  chose  que  la  simple 
presence  de  1'idde,  sans  aucun  accessoire  de  causalite  finale." 
Complete  fusion  between  the  idea  and  the  form  is  required, ', 
or  the  highest  beauty  is  not  attained.  When  the  harmony 
is  incomplete,  we  have  lesser  degrees  of  beauty.  Plants, 
for  example,  do  not  fulfil  the  highest  idea  of  beauty,  • 
nor  do  the  lower  animals  ;  but  when  the  soul  shows  itself! 
through  a  form,  and  renders  that  form  in  some  sort  trans- 
parent, then  it  is  that  the  idea  is  triumphant,  and  beauty 
appears  in  its  glory.  Thus  Beauty  is  a  manifestation,  "  im-; 
mediate  et  libre,"  of  the  divine  idea,  revealing  itself  inv 
"  formes  sensibles."  Its  source  is  above  Nature.  It  belongs 
essentially  to  the  ideal  world  ;  and,  if  Nature  contains  it,  she 
does  not  possess  it.  It  has  no  direct  relation  to  the  material 
world.  It  is  to  man  that  it  appeals,  its  true  mission  being, 
to  rouse  our  aesthetic  faculties,  and  thus  become  the  founda-' 
tion  of  a  new  world  of  ideal  creation.  Beauty,  in  itself,  is  a 


120  The  PJiilosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

'primordial  idea,  of  which  natural  beauty  is  a  partial  reflection. 
To  demand  a  reason  for  the  existence  of  that  idea  is  to  seek 
a  condition  for  that  which  is  unconditioned  and  absolute. 

The  primary  condition  of  our  discernment  of  the  Beautiful 
is  a  perception  of  the  object  endowed  with  beauty.  Sight 
and  hearing  alone  put  us  in  "  rapport "  with  the  beautiful. 
These  are  our  most  intellectual  senses.  The  impression 
of  the  beautiful  through  them  is  accompanied  with  pleasure, 
not  because  our  senses  are  satisfied,  but  because  our  inward 
I  being  is  penetrated.  A  characteristic  of  all  aesthetic  feeling 
jis  that  it  remains  free  of  personal  interest  in  every  form. 
The  beautiful  pleases  us,  not  because  it  appeals  to  our  sen- 
suous nature,  nor  because  it  is  useful  or  moral,  nor  even 
\  because  it  is  true,  but  simply  because  it  is  in  itself  beautiful. 
It  is  at  last  defined  as  the  immediate  intuitive  revelation 
of  an  invisible  principle,  and  Pictet  concludes  by  laying 
stress  on  the  universality  of  the  idea.  "  Emanating,"  he  says, 
"as  a  pure  ray  from  the  supreme  Intelligence,  this  idea 
reveals  itself  in  Nature  ;  thence  reflected  by  Art,  it  shines 
under  a  thousand  different  forms  in  the  heart  of  humanity." 

Henri -Frederic  Amiel  (1821-1881)  caught  inspiration 
as  a  youth  from  the  lectures  of  M.  Pictet  at  Geneva  in 
1840,  and  two  years  later,  after  spending  a  year  in  Italy 
and  Sicily,  he  made  his  first  contribution  to  literature  by 
sending  three  articles  on  M.  Rio's  book,  LlArt  Chretien,  to 
the  Bibliotheque  Universelle  de  Geneve.  After  several  years 
of  study  in  Germany,  he  was  appointed  in  1849  Professor 
of  ^Esthetics  in  Geneva,  which  four  years  later  he  exchanged 
for  the  chair  of  Mental  and  Moral  Philosophy.  Amiel  was 
an  idealist  and  a  mystic  of  the  Alexandrian  type.  "  There  is 
no  repose  except  in  the  absolute,  the  infinite,  and  the  divine." 
"  What  I  desire  is  the  sum  of  all  desires,  what  I  seek  to  know 
is  the  sum  of  all  kinds  of  knowledge."  The  real  disgusted 
and  even  terrified  him,  but  he  could  not  find  the  ideal. 
Hence  the  sad  undertones  of  his  Journal  Interne,  in  which 
we  have  a  prolonged  introspective  analysis  of  the  inner  life. 
There  are  some  passages  in  the  Journal  Intime  which 
are  probably  more  relevant  to  the  subject  of  Beauty  than 
all  his  lectures  on  ^Esthetics,  e.g.  December  26,  1852 — 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  121 

"Look  twice,  if  you  want  a  just  conception  ;  look  once,  if  j1 
what  you  want  is  a  sense  of  beauty."  April  3,  1865 — "To  ! 
the  materialist  philosopher  the  beautiful  is  a  mere  accident, 
and  therefore  rare.  To  the  spiritualist  philosopher  the 
beautiful  is  the  rule,  the  law,  the  universal  foundation  of 
things,  to  which  every  form  returns,  as  soon  as  the  force  of 
accident  is  withdrawn.  Why  are  we  ugly  ?  Because  we  are  - 
evil,  morose,  and  unhappy.  Heroism,  ecstasy,  love,  en- 
thusiasm, wear  a  halo  round  the  brow,  for  they  are  a  setting 
free  of  the  soul,  which  through  them  gains  force  to  make 
its  envelope  transparent,  and  shine  through  upon  all  around 
it.  Beauty  is  thus  a  phenomenon  belonging  to  the  spiritual- 
isation  of  matter.  It  is  a  momentary  transfiguration  of  the 
privileged  object,  to  remind  us  of  the  ideal.  To  study  it  is  to' 
Platonise  almost  inevitably.  As  a  powerful  electric  current 
can  render  metals  luminous,  and  reveal  their  essence  by 
the  colour  of  their  flame,  so  intense  life  and  supreme  joy 
can  make  the  most  simple  mortal  dazzlingly  beautiful.  .  .  . 
The  ideal  is,  after  all,  truer  than  the  real ;  for  the  ideal  is  the 
eternal  element  in  perishable  things,  it  is  their  type,  their 
sum,  their  raison  d^etre^  and  the  most  exact  and  the  most 
condensed  expression  of  them."  April  9,  1868 — "I  have 
been  spending  three  hours  over  Lotze's  Geschichte  der 
Aesthetik  in  Deutschland.  It  begins  attractively,  but  the 
attraction  wanes,  and  by  the  end  I  was  very  tired  of  it. 
Why  ?  Because  the  noise  of  a  mill-wheel  sends  one  to 
sleep,  and  these  pages  without  paragraphs,  these  inter- 
minable chapters  and  their  incessant  dialectical  clatter, 
affect  me  as  though  I  were  listening  to  a  windmill.  I  end 
by  yawning,  like  any  simple  non-philosophical  mortal,  in 
the  face  of  all  this  heaviness  and  pedantry.  .  .  .  Do  these 
pedantic  books  leave  a  single  image  or  formula,  a  single 
view  or  striking  fact  behind  them  in  the  memory,  when  one 
puts  them  down  ?  No  ;  nothing  but  confusion  and  fatigue. 
Oh  for  clearness,  terseness,  brevity.  .  .  .  The  Germans 
gather  fuel  for  the  pile  ;  it  is  the  French  who  kindle  it." 

A  somewhat  popular  Swiss  writer,  Alexandre  Vinet  (i  797- 
1847),  has  some  suggestive  remarks  on  the  feeling  for  Nature 
being  peculiar  to  certain  epochs.  An  age  that  is  artificially 


122  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

civilised  turns  from  itself  to  Nature,  but  it  is  "only  the 
social  man  who  is  in  a  condition  to  feel  Nature.  .  .  .  The 
more  we  have  cultivated  social  intercourse,  and  suffered 
from  it,  the  more  rich  and  profound  Nature  becomes.  .  .  . 
All  its  parts  are  mysteriously  allied  to  our  inner  being. 
This  unity  and  universal  harmony  is  instinctively  revealed 
to  all  minds."  He  adds  that  "at  a  certain  depth  the  good 
and  the  beautiful  are  one."  Vinet's  remarks  on  Poetry  and 
Philosophy  are  excellent.  "  Once  arrived  in  the  region  of 
science,  oppressed  beneath  the  whole  burden  of  acquired 
knowledge,  but  having  always  the  same  need  of  air  and 
space,  the  human  mind  seeks  both  in  another  region,  that 
of  metaphysical  speculation.  If  poetry  was  the  philosophy 
of  early  ages,  philosophy  is  perhaps  the  poetry  of  our  era ; 
it  is  a  new  method  of  recovering  liberty."  1 

The  earliest  work  of  C.  V.  Cherbuliez,  novelist,  and  after- 
wards one  of  the  writers  in  the  Revue  des  Deux  Mondes,  was 
A  propos  d'un  cheval,  Causeries  atheniennes  (Geneve,  1 860). 
It  is  an  animated  discussion,  in  the  form  of  a  tale,  on  one  of 
the  metopes  of  the  Parthenon,  in  which  an  attempt  is  made 
to  discover  where  the  unique  power  and  beauty  of  this 
work  of  Phidias  lies.  The  horse,  carved  in  marble,  seems 
endowed  with  life ;  and  every  one  who  sees  it  admires  it  rather 
as  a  work  of  nature  than  of  art.  How  then  has  the  artist 
robbed  Nature  of  her  inmost  secrets,  and  been  able  to 
produce  an  illusion  which  affects  even  the  coldest  and  most 
critical  ?  The  various  individuals — the  doctor,  the  abbe, 
and  the  chevalier — advance  different  theories. 

The  first  theory  is  that  Phidias  selected  points  of  beauty 
from  the  race  of  horses,  which  he  united  to  form  a  whole, 
more  beautiful  than  any  one  horse  that  ever  existed.  The 
second  theory — the  abbe's  —  is  that  Phidias,  the  divine 
sculptor,  knew  by  intuition  that  in  art,  as  in  nature,  all 
parts  must  be  connected.  The  Infinite  is  the  supreme 
logician,  and  the  artist  used  this  logic  as  Prometheus  stole 
fire  from  heaven.  Nothing  can  be  beautiful  that  is  not 
individual  ;  the  form  of  a  thing  is  its  limit.  Through  its 

1  Cf.  Esprit  d' Alexandre  Vinet,  Penstes et Reflexions,  etc.,  par  J.  F. 
Asti6,  1 86 1. 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  123 

limits  it  must  manifest  itself;  its  soul  must  penetrate 
through  its  body.  In  this  Phidian  sculptured  horse  there 
is  something  human,  and  more  than  human  ;  and  in  the 
contemplation  of  it,  some  of  that  force  and  beauty  is 
communicated  to  us.  Insignificant  as  we  are,  we  are  bound 
to  admire  and  to  say,  "  Tu  es  la  force  qui  se  connait  et  se 
possede,  tu  es  la  beaute  qui  joint  d'elles  memes,  tu  es  ce 
qu'il  y  a  de  meilleur  et  de  plus  precieux  dans  I'humanite." 

This  is  disputed  by  the  chevalier,  who  proposes  to  demon- 
strate that  the  beautiful  steed  is  a  natural  phenomenon. 


7.  Leveque  to  Thore 

The  next  important  work,  and  one  of  the  most  significant 
in  the  history  of  French  esthe'tique,  is  LeVeque's  La  Science 
du  Beau,  published  in  1862.  Its  original  form  was  that  of  a 
prize  essay  on  the  subject,  prescribed  by  the  French  Academy 
of  Moral  and  Political  Sciences.  It  was  afterwards  expanded 
into  a  treatise  in  two  volumes,  extending  to  1000  pages. 

The  ground -plan  of  the  book  was  prearranged  for 
Leveque  by  the  terms  laid  down  for  competition  ;  and 
both  the  essay  and  the  treatise  are  admirably  arranged. 
The  effect  of  the  appreciation  of  the  beautiful  on  human 
nature,  not  only  on  the  intellect  and  feelings,  but  also  on  the 
practical  tendencies  of  the  race,  is  first  discussed.  The 
essential  nature  of  Beauty  is  next  considered  ;  whether  it  is 
an  ultimate  fact  in  the  universe,  and  if  so,  what  it  is  in 
itself.  Then  the  outcome  of  Beauty  in  Nature,  both 
organic  and  inorganic,  is  dealt  with  ;  and  lastly  the  appli- 
cation of  Beauty  in  the  various  Arts  is  examined.  The 
historical  excursus  —  dealing  with  previous  theory  from 
Plato  to  Hegel — is  excellent,  although  the  author  at  times 
applies  his  a  priori  views  to  the  interpretation  of  the 
history,  which  detracts  from  his  impartiality. 

Leveque  caught  the  spirit  of  Schelling  and  Hegel,  as 
well  as  of  Goethe  and  Schiller,  and  of  his  own  master 
Jouffroy.  This  is  seen  in  his  recognition  of  Beauty  as  the 
expression  or  manifestation  of  something  invisible  behind 


124  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

Nature,  —  a  force,  or  spirit,  thus  adumbrated  to  us. 
Whether  in  the  realm  of  the  organic  or  of  the  inorganic,  all 
outward  Beauty  is  the  expression  of  an  immaterial  principle 
behind  it.  Take  some  of  its  manifestations.  The  law  of 
gravitation,  for  example,  is  the  disclosure  of  an  immaterial 
force  in  the  material  world.  If  we  select  a  vital  product  of 
Nature,  such  as  a  flower,  all  its  phases — colour,  grace  of 
form,  unity  in  variety — manifest  to  us  the  workings  of  an 
unseen  power  which  is  making  for  order.  In  every  realm 
it  is  the  same.  We  discern  in  Beauty  the  outcome  of  an 
ordered  energy,  which — consciously  or  unconsciously,  or 
both  together — is  working  towards  completion. 

In  the  fourth  section  of  the  Treatise  there  are  many 
happy  bits  of  criticism.  He  acutely  shows  how  the  beauty 
of  Architecture,  for  example,  is  the  expression  of  latent 
ideas.  Its  primary  aim  was  not  use,  or  convenience,  or  fit- 
ness for  anything.  It  was  meant  to  express  thought.  Take  a 
church,  or  a  temple,  a  palace,  a  chateau,  a  villa,  a  theatre,  a 
cloister,  a  bridge,  or  a  tomb, — they  all  express,  and  were 
meant  to  express,  something  beyond  the  material  structure 
that  is  raised.  Leveque  is  a  consistent  intellectualist  through- 
out. In  his  classification  of  the  Arts  he  follows  Hegel. 

When  we  reach  the  work  of  M.  Taine,  who  was  Professor 
of  ^Esthetics  and  of  the  History  of  Art  in  the  Iicole  des 
Beaux-Arts  in  Paris,  we  find  an  interpretation  of  the  Beauti- 
ful in  marked  contrast  to  that  of  Leveque.  Taine  has  added 
to  our  ever-accumulating  criticism  a  somewhat  remarkable 
work  on  the  literature  of  England  ;  and  both  in  that  work, 
and  in  his  aesthetic,  he  has  applied  the  method  and  the  prin- 
ciples of  Comte  to  his  study  of  the  subject.  The  lectures 
on  aesthetics,  which  form  his  little  book  on  the  Philosophy 
of  Art,  were  delivered  to  the  students  in  the  winter  of 
1 864.  It  is  his  aim  to  explain  the  evolution  of  art  by  social, 
racial,  and  climatic  causes;  his  sole  purpose  "being  to 
mark  the  characteristics,  and  to  seek  the  causes  " — that  is 
to  say,  the  phenomenal  antecedents — of  this  or  that  particu- 
lar aspect  which  the  Beautiful  has  for  a  time  assumed. 
His  work  is  not  only  a  meagre  and  surface  one,  but  it 
contains  a  misreading  of  history.  When  he  is  not  stating 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  125 

commonplaces,  he  is  off  the  line  of  philosophic  construction. 
It  is  surely  no  great  discovery  for  a  savant  to  make,  that  a 
work  of  Art  is  not  an  isolated  product ;  and  to  affirm  that 
we  must  study  what  gave  rise  to  it — the  intellectual  and 
social  conditions  of  its  age — before  we  can  understand  it,  is 
to  state  a  proposition  which  nobody  can  deny.  Every  one 
knows  that  the  artist  is  one  of  a  group  greater  than  himself, 
and  that  all  artists  are  in  part  created  by  their  time. 

M.  Taine  writes  "  as  one  having  authority " ;  but  his 
walk,  his  intellectual  gait,  is  just  a  trifle  too  majestic. 
His  essays  are  all  in  the  grand  manner,  and  they  often  end 
in  platitude.  But  he  begins  his  discussion  —  as  every 
evolutionist  is  scientifically  bound  to  begin — with  the  pro- 
mise of  great  catholicity.  He  avows  his  sympathy  with 
every  form  of  Art,  and  with  every  school,  as  each  and  all 
phases  of  human  activity ;  and  therefore  the  more  numer- 
ous they  are,  the  richer  the  tribute  they  offer  to  us,  nay,  the 
more  contradictory  they  are,  the  fuller  the  witness  they 
bear  to  the  wealth  of  human  nature.  But  this  delightful 
aesthetic  preamble  ends  in  a  mere  catalogue  of  theories,  a 
series  of  dead  phenomenal  facts  strung  on  a  thread  of  a 
positivist  chronicle.  Taine  says  :  "  ^Esthetic  science  is  like 
Botany,  in  which  the  orange,  the  laurel,  the  pine,  and  the 
birch  are  of  equal  interest.  It  is  a  kind  of  botanical 
method  applied,  not  to  plants,  but  to  the  works  of  man." 
Good  ;  but  we  want  the  miscellaneous  assortment  of  facts,  not 
merely  inventoried  for  us,  and  even  scientifically  catalogued, 
but  also  interpreted,  and  this  M.  Taine  does  not  attempt. 
Walt- Whitman-like,  he  contents  himself  with  a  mere  /«/,  of 
which  it  may  with  truth  be  said  that  there  is  no  reason  why 
it  should  begin  at  any  particular  place,  or  end  at  any  other, 
or  why,  having  once  begun,  it  should  not  go  on  for  ever. 

Taine  falls  back,  of  necessity,  on  Imitation  as  the  object 
of  Art,  though  the  imitation  is  not  to  be  "  exact."  We 
must  closely  imitate  some  things,  but  not  everything  in 
Nature.  The  Artist  has  to  select,  and  to  reproduce,  the 
relationships  of  parts,  each  to  each  ;  and  he  has  to  reproduce 
objects,  so  as  to  re-embody  their  essential  characteristics. 
But  in  making  the  concession  that  "  it  is  the  object  of  all 


126  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

Art  to  manifest  some  essential  character,  and" — with 
that  end  in  view — "  to  make  use  of  a  group  of  associated 
parts,  the  relationship  of  which  the  artist  combines  and 
modifies"  (Pt.  I.  ch.  vi.),  Taine  really  abandons  his  original 
theory.  "  The  end  of  a  work  of  Art,"  he  elsewhere  says, 
"  is  to  manifest  some  ultimate  -characteristic,  and  therefore 
some  idea,  more  clearly  than  real  objects  do."  So  far  well. 
But  in  conceding  this  principle  of  idealism,  it  is  to  be  noted 
that  Taine  entirely  ignores  feeling,  as  a  cause  co-operating 
with  thought,  in  the  production  of  a  work  of  Art.  He  recog- 
nises intellectual  causes  only  ;  while  his  positivist  method  of 
reading  History  allows  him  to  take  note  only  of  antecedents 
and  sequents.  He  therefore  chronicles  the  various  elements 
that  co-operated  in  the  age  of  Pericles  to  make  Greek  art  so 
brilliant,  and  those  at  the  modern  renaissance  which  made  the 
Florentine  school  so  great ;  but  as  to  the  creative  force,  the 
vital  formative  power  lying  latent  in  these  two  periods,  and 
efflorescing  in  them, — the  power  which  rises  toward  the  ideal, 
and  approximately  touches  it, — of  that  he  knows  nothing. 

Perhaps  the  best  recent  study  of  English  ^Esthetics 
by  a  French  writer  is  J.  Milsand's  critical  examination  of 
Ruskin — Uesthetique  anglaise,  etude  sur  M.  John  Ruskin, 
par  J.  Milsand  (1864).  It  is  for  the  most  part  drawn  from 
two  articles  which  he  had  previously  contributed,  in  1860 
and  1 86 1,  to  the  Revue  des  Deux Mondes.  M.  Milsand  con- 
siders Ruskin's  theories  and  appreciations  typically  English. 
They  reflect  at  once  the  excellences  and  the  defects  of  the 
national  character.  Springing  from  Protestant  tradition, 
religion,  conviction,  and  intense  love  of  nature,  they  present 
a  remarkable  mixture  of  imagination  and  realism,  a  union 
in  which  much  sentiment  predominates  over  clear  intelli- 
gence. Ruskin's  ideas  are  as  remote  as  the  antipodes  from 
French  thought.  At  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century, 
France  broke  with  tradition — a  revolution  shared  by  all 
Europe.  England  alone  resented  this  upheaval  and  con- 
tented herself  with  gradual  reform.  True,  certain  spirits  in 
England  took  arms  in  the  cause  of  revolution.  England 
works  by  evolution,  France  by  revolution.  England  was 
slow  to  perceive  that  the  new  spirit  of  the  age  was  a  life, 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  127 

and  a  creative  force  ;  and  it  was  long  before  she  trans- 
formed this  force  into  a  doctrine.  England  remains  true  to 
her  Protestant  traditions.  English  aesthetics  are  an  exami- 
nation of  the  conscience,  a  moral  practice.  The  most 
impassioned  expounder  of  this  artistic  movement  is  Ruskin. 
A  great  painter  in  words,  a  poet  in  descriptive  power  and 
enthusiasm,  his  thoughts  are  often  hallucinations,  even 
contradictions.  He  confounds  the  beautiful  and  the  real. 
By  his  antipathy  to  the  subjective  theory,  he  makes  Beauty 
consist  of  a  pure  idea;  every  kind  of  Beauty  is  but  a 
reflexion  of  the  Divine  Perfection.  Launched  into  this 
Platonism,  his  imagination  becomes  intoxicated.  What 
Ruskin  has  done  is  to  present  us  with  the  ethics  of  Art. 
Now  the  French  make  knowledge  the  principle  of  good,  and 
ignorance  the  principle  of  evil,  because  they  have  lost  the 
instinct  of  unity.  They  have  tried  to  find  by  sheer  clever- 
ness the  knack  of  putting  into  artistic  work  a  dignity,  an 
emotion,  and  beauty  that  is  not  in  them.  Ruskin  has  taught 
us  that  the  secret  either  of  triumph  or  of  defeat  lies  in  the 
moral  being,  in  the  good  or  the  evil  that  lives  in  the  depth 
of  the  heart ;  and  he  has  put  his  finger  on  the  true  principle 
of  all  genius  and  power.  "  Be  Mussulman,  be  Christian," 
he  says,  "but  believe  in  something  outside  of  yourself." 

Theophile  Thore  (1807-1869),  a  distinguished  French 
publicist  and  critic,  has  written  many  articles  on  Beauty 
and  the  Arts,  in  the  Artiste,  the  Siecle,  and  the  Constitu- 
tionnel.  He  was  the  editor  of  L>Art  Moderne,  and  wrote 
critical  notices  of  the  French  Salons  from  1844  to  1847. 
He  wrote  also  under  the  nom-de-plume  of  W.  Burger.1  In 
the  Salon  of  1847  he  wrote  :  "  Nature  is  the  supreme  artist, 
who,  in  her  universal  gallery,  offers  to  a  favoured  few  the 
principles  of  all  proportion  ;  the  object  is  to  develop  some 
sort  of  individuality,  a  second  creation,  with  its  own  distinct 
and  original  signification.  But  Art  is  the  human  interpreta- 
tion of  Nature.  The  more  the  artist  has  transformed 
external  reality,  the  more  of  himself  he  has  put  into  his 

1  Salons  de  T.  Thort,  1844,  1845,  1846,  1847,  1848,  avec  une 
preface  par  W.  Burger  (1868).  Salons  de  W.  Burger,  1861  a  1868, 
avec  une  preface  par  T.  Thort  (2  vols.  1870). 


128  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

work,  the  nearer  has  he  approached  to  the  ideal."  A  work 
written  by  M.  There  in  1857,  Nouvelles  Tendances  de  I' Art, 
contains  a  review  of  the  progress  of  the  Arts  from  the  days 
of  Phidias  onwards.  He  complained  that  most  of  it  had 
been  too  symbolic,  till  we  come  down  to  the  Dutch  school  in 
the  sixteenth  century,  and  to  the  French  in  the  seventeenth  ; 
and  he  held  that  the  worship  of  the  past,  of  classic  models 
precedents  and  attainments,  was  fatal  to  the  rise  of  new  Art. 
It  is  only  when  it  breaks  through  the  fetters  of  the  past, 
and  defies  precedent,  that  Art  is  truly  great.  Why,  he  asks, 
should  we  not,  or  at  least  should  the  future  not,  excel  Raphael 
and  Angelo,  as  they  excelled  the  Greeks  ?  It  can  be  done,  if 
we  give  up  the  imitation  of  classic  types,  and  create  afresh. 

In  his  Grammaire  des  Arts  du  Dessin  (1867),  Charles 
Blanc,  member  of  the  French  Institute,  discusses  Archi- 
tecture, Sculpture,  and  Painting,  as  well  as  engraving  of 
all  sorts.  (In  an  earlier  work — which  he  undertook  in 
1849,  along  with  M.  Arsene  Houssaye  and  M.  Theophile 
Gautier — he  sketched  the  Histoire  des  peintres  de  toutes  les 
ecoles.  It  begins  with  a  discussion  on  the  sublime  and  the 
beautiful.)  In  the  earliest  ages  Nature  may  have  presented 
the  spectacle  of  the  sublime,  but  not  of  the  beautiful.  The 
sublime  may  be  found  in  chaos,  or  in  the  horrible;  but 
beauty  requires  order,  proportion,  and  harmony.  The 
beautiful  is  always  human  ;  but  the  sublime  partakes  of  the 
\  divine  and  opens  before  us  a  vista  to  the  Infinite.  As  we 
'  have  an  innate  feeling  of  the  just,  we  bring  with  us  into 
the  world  an  intuition  of  the  beautiful,  which  is  the  ideal. 
To  learn  this  is  simply,  as  Plato  teaches,  to  recollect  it. 
"  Apprendre — c'est  se  ressouvenir." 

All  the  germs  of  beauty  are  in  Nature,  but  it  is  the 
mind  of  man  alone  that  can  disengage  them.  That  Nature 
is  beautiful,  man  knows  ;  but  Nature  herself  does  not !  Thus 
Beauty  exists  only  in  the  mind  of  man  ;  and  the  artist  who 
understands  the  beautiful  is  greater  than  Nature  which  shows 
it.  The  artist  purifies  reality  from  the  accidents  that  dis- 
figure it,  and  from  the  alloy  that  debases  it.  He  re-finds  the 
idea,  which  his  art  interprets,  idealises,  and  transfigures. 
This  is  the  mission  of  the  artist — not  only  to  give  enjoy- 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  129 

ment  or  ornament  to  life,  but  to  reawake  in  us  the  ideal, 
to  reveal  to  us  the  Beauty  inherent  in  things,  to  discover 
the  imperishable  essence ;  and  the  ideas  which  Nature 
presents  under  an  obscure  or  perplexed  form,  Art  makes 
plain.  Beauty  in  Nature  is  liable  to  destruction  ;  Art  raises 
itself  above  time  and  death.  Take,  for  instance,  the  Niobe. 
A  living  woman  passes  her  life  in  becoming  beautiful  and 
in  losing  beauty  ;  she  has  not  one  moment  of  perfect 
beauty,  but  the  artist  comes,  and  he  renders  an  invisible 
beauty  visible.  He  passes  over  all  that  is  not  essential  in 
time,  and  makes  the  essence  live  for  ever. 

Speaking  of  the  sublime  in  architecture,  Blanc  says  it 
has  three  essentials — greatness  of  dimension,  simplicity  of 
surface,  and  continuity  of  line.  The  sacrifice  of  one  of  these 
three  dimensions  of  space,  however,  is  sometimes  an  element 
of  grandeur.  St.  Peter's  at  Rome,  for  example,  disappoints 
us,  because  there  is  a  too  perfect  concordance  of  the  three 
dimensions.  Its  height,  its  width,  and  its  depth  neutralise 
each  other.  Some  small  buildings  (especially  some  Gothic 
ones)  impress  one  more  than  this  vast  cathedral,  because, 
with  less  material,  they  appeal  more  to  the  mind.  They 
deceive  the  eye,  for  the  good  of  the  soul. 

Art  in  Sculpture,  he  says,  consists  in  raising  an  individual 
truth  to  the  height  of  the  type,  and  the  type  itself  to  beauty  ; 
seeking  in  real  life  for  the  features  of  the  ideal.  To  idealise 
a  lion,  for  instance,  the  sculptor  would  take  whatever  points 
were  common  to  all  lions,  and  were  characteristic  of  the  lion- 
nature,  such  as  majesty,  force,  ferocity.  He  defines  Painting 
as  the  art  of  expressing  the  conceptions  of  the  soul  through 
the  realities  of  nature ;  representing  on  a  single  surface, 
unity,  form,  and  colour.  He  goes  minutely  into  the  means  of 
doing  this,  treating  of  the  laws  of  colour,  etc.,  with  elaborate 
descriptions  and  illustrations  of  many  world-famous  pictures. 

In  a  work  entitled  L'optique  et  les  Arts,  in  the  Bibliothtque 
de  Philosophic  Contemporame  ( 1 869),  the  author,  M.  Auguste 
Laugel,  emphasises  the  principle  of  order  and  harmonious 
proportions,  not  in  opposition  to  the  views  of  Thord,  but  as 
a  supplement.  He  says:  "The  Beautiful  cannot  have  its 
origin  in  tumult,  in  the  echo  of  a  set  of  sounds  in  which  no 

K 


130  The  PhilosopJiy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

•measure  or  harmony  can  be  discerned  ;  nor  can  it  be  found, 
amongst  the  plastic  arts,  in  a  miscellaneous  medley  of 
colours  and  of  lines.  The  ideas  which  the  arts  express 
must  be  made  intelligible  through  forms  and  figures,  light 
and  shade,  etc.  ...  If  there  is  no  common  measure,  if 
contrasts  are  not  managed  with  skill,  if  the  small  and  the 
large,  if  light  and  shade,  if  the  simple  and  the  rich  jostle 
with  each  other,  and  are  intermingled  without  judgment, 
and  without  rule,  all  pleasure  is  lost,  because  the  idea  and 
the  thought  which  underlie  the  material  envelope  do  not 
exist." 


8.   Veron,  Coster,  Vallet,  etc. 

In  1878,  Eugene  Vdron,  publicist  and  journalist  in 
Paris,  who  edited  the  journal  LArt,  published  L? Esthetique. 
It  was  the  fourth  volume  of  the  Bibliotheque  des  Sciences 
Contemporaines.  He  had  previously  published  La  Mythologie 
dans  VArt  (1878),  and  has  since  written  Histoire  naturelle 
des  Religions  (1884)  and  La  Morale  (1884). 

The  aim  of  his  work  will  be  seen  from  the  following 
sentence : — 

"Art  is  nothing  but  a  natural  result  of  man's  organisation, 
which  is  of  such  a  nature  that  he  derives  particular  pleasure  from 
certain  combinations  of  forms,  lines,  colours,  movements,  sounds, 
rhythms,  and  images  ;  but  these  combinations  only  give  him  plea- 
sure when  they  express  the  sentiments  of  the  soul,  struggling  with 
the  accidents  of  life,  and  in  presence  of  natural  scenes. " 

True  Art  is  not  imitation,  or  slavish  devotion  to  the  pre- 
cedents of  the  past,  nor  is  it  a  realistic  imitation  of  nature. 

"Man  puts  something  of  his  own  nature  into  everything  he 
does.  .  .  .  He  always  adds  something  not  actually  before  his  eyes 
which  comes  from  within  himself,  his  own  personal  emotions  and 
impressions.  .  .  .  Of  the  three  forms  of  Art — the  conventional, 
the  realistic,  and  the  personal,  the  last  alone  deserves  the  name. 
.  .  .  The  essential  constituent  of  Art  is  the  personality  of  the 
artist.  .  .  .  The  source  of  all  poetry  is  the  soul  of  the  poet." 

With  the  exception  of  some  foolish  sneers  at  a  priori 


xi  TJie  Philosophy  of  France  131 

theorists — and  at  Philosophy  and  Metaphysics  generally, 
e.g.  his  assertion  that  Plato's  idealism  is  "refuted  by  its 
mere  recital"! — there  is  much  that  is  excellent  in  this 
book.  In  a  chapter  on  the  origin  and  grouping  of  the  Arts, 
he  shows  that  Art  is  a  spontaneous  and  necessary  outcome 
of  human  activity ;  and  he  arranges  the  several  arts,  as 
those  which  appeal  respectively  to  the  eye  and  to  the 
ear — Poetry,  Music,  and  Dancing  appealing  to  the  sense  of 
hearing  ;  while  Sculpture,  Painting,  and  Architecture  appeal 
to  the  sense  of  sight.  He  shows  that  the  primitive  Art  of 
prehistoric  times,  as  seen  in  drawings  on  the  walls  of  cave- 
dwellings,  was  not  merely  imitative.  Nevertheless  all  art  is 
essentially  subjective,  or  the  expression  of  man's  personality. 
Esthetic  pleasure  differs  from  the  pleasures  of  sense,  which 
are  self-centred  and  self-confined.  Art  extracts  admiration 
from  us,  because  the  personality  of  the  artist  shines  through 
it.  All  "aesthetic  pleasure  is  essentially  admiration." 

After  the  analysis  of  Taste  and  Genius,  Veron  raises  the 
question,  What  is  Art  ?  the  art  that  is  born  with  man, 
and  is  found  in  nearly  all  his  thoughts  and  acts,  which  is 
natural  and  necessary  to  him,  and  which  rules  the  formation 
of  all  his  ideas  ?  In  answering  the  question,  he  first 
glances  at  the  historic  growth  and  development  of  the 
several  Arts.  In  the  oldest  Vedic  hymns  we  find  the 
natural,  the  spontaneous,  the  unsophisticated  outpourings 
of  emotion  before  the  forms  of  Nature.  They  are  con- 
strued as  living  beings,  hostile  or  friendly  to  man.  To 
this  succeeded  self-conscious  art,  in  which  the  personality 
of  the  artist,  a  subjective  element,  dominates  over  the 
objectivity  of  earlier  art.  Art  became  analytic,  after  its 
early  crude  synthesis.  He  deals  similarly  with  the  other 
arts  —  music,  sculpture,  painting,  and  architecture.  He 
affirms  that,  far  from  being  its  late  blossom,  or  only  the 
fruit  of  civilisation,  art  is  rather  its  germ.  It  arose  in  the 
search  for,  and  in  the  effort  to  reach,  the  best  of  things. 
Art,  in  general,  is  the  manifestation  of  emotion,  which  is 
externally  construed"  or  interpreted  by  form,  colour,  sound, 
etc.  ;  and  the  special  merit  of  any  work  of  Art  is  its 
power  of  manifesting  and  of  interpreting  emotion. 


132  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

In  his  definition  of  ^Esthetics,  Veron  is  far  less  successful, 
his  anti-metaphysical  bias  incapacitating  him  for  the  task. 
Beauty  as  an  entity,  is  dismissed  at  once  into  the  limbo  of 
the  unintelligible.  Because  art  can  deal  with  the  horrible 
and  the  repulsive,  as  well  as  with  the  beautiful,  the  realisa- 
tion of  Beauty  is  not  the  aim  of  art.  Beauty  cannot  be 
the  result  of  perfection  because,  he  says,  Art  can  make 
us  enjoy  the  sight  of  objects  which  would  naturally  repel 
us !  Veron  rejects  the  imitative  theory,  as  taught  by 
Aristotle,  Boileau,  and  Pascal.  On  that  theory,  Photo- 
graphy would  be  the  most  perfect  art,  and  if  we  could 
photograph  colour,  it  would  supersede  landscape  painting. 
Realistic  portraiture  may  be  all  in  all  to  the  historian,  but 
the  Artist  desires  the  reproduction  of  life  and  movement. 
v  The  frescoes  in  the  Sistine  Chapel  are  not  realistic.  The 
beautiful  in  Art  is  always  due  to  the  intervention  of  the 
genius  of  the  artist,  who  throws  his  own  individuality  into 
his  work,  when  stirred  by  emotion.  He  creates  the  beauti- 
ful ;  and  the  object  and  aim  of  the  science  of  aesthetics  is 
the  study  of  this  outcome  of  artistic  genius. 

Art  is  either  decorative  or  expressive.  The  two  run 
together  ;  because  all  decorative  art  may  be  also  expressive, 
and  expressive  art  may  be  decorative.  Nevertheless  the  two 
are  broadly  contrasted.  Decorative  Art  is  addressed  to  the 
eye  and  the  ear,  and  it  achieves  its  result  by  certain  arrange- 
ments of  lines,  forms,  colours,  sounds,  rhythms,  movements, 
light  and  shade,  without  any  intervening  idea  or  sentiment. 
It  arises  out  of  the  desire  for  beauty,  and  in  beauty  it  rests. 
It  is  found  not  only  in  architecture,  sculpture,  and  painting, 
but  also  in  music,  poetry,  rhetoric,  and  the  dance.  Express- 
ive Art,  on  the  other  hand,  discloses  ideas  and  sentiments. 
It  is  the  manifestation  of  thought  and  feeling,  by  forms  and 
attitudes,  by  colours,  sounds,  and  the  rhythm  of  language. 
Decorative  art  deals  with  and  reflects  the  beautiful. 
Expressive  art  deals  with  character,  purpose,  tendency. 
The  former  suited  the  ancient  world,  attaining  perfection 
amongst  the  Greeks ;  but  it  does  not  suffice  for  the 
modern  world.  We  now  need  that  kind  of  Art  which 
expresses  character,  which  goes  beneath  appearances,  and 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  133 

discloses  to  us  the  personality  of  the  artist,  showing  the 
range  of  his  faculty  and  the  extent  of  his  insight. 

In  the  chapter  on  Style  the  aphorism  of  Buffon,  "  Le 
style  c'est  Phomme,"  is  endorsed,  so  far  as  it  is  the  style 
of  each,  or  his  characteristic  way  of  looking  on  Nature,  and 
reproducing  it,  that  differentiates  him  from  other  men.  It 
is  the  "  reflection  of  the  artist's  personality."  Thore,  in  his 
Salon  of  1863,  agrees  with  the  teaching  of  Ve'ron  on  this 
subject : — "  In  works  which  instruct  us,  the  authors  in  a 
way  substitute  themselves  for  nature."  It  is  always  the 
individuality  of  the  artist  that  produces  Art.  That  is  the 
key  to  Veron's  book.  Then,  and  then  only,  have  we  (as 
Thore  put  it)  "Tart  pour  Phomine." 

But  the  pendulum  sways  incessantly  to  and  fro  between 
the  opposite  poles  of  philosophic  thought.  The  idealistic 
flood  succeeds  the  materialistic  ebb  with  the  constancy  of  the 
tides  and  the  seasons.  In  1 880,  two  years  after  Veron's  book 
appeared,  a  Belgian  writer,  Guillaume  Herbert  de  Coster, 
issued  one,  which  he  called  Elements  de  V  Esthetique  generate ; 
and  three  years  later,  P.  Vallet  published  his  I^Ictee  du 
Beau,  dans  la  philosophic  de  Saint  Thomas  d'Aquin. 

According  to  M.  de  Coster,  the  science  of  Esthetics  must 
not  be  confounded  with  the  history  of  Art,  nor  even  with 
the  power  of  discriminating  between  the  art  of  different 
masters,  races,  or  epochs.  It  is  easy  to  see,  for  instance, 
the  difference  between  a  Greek  and  a  Gothic  statue.  Each 
is  equally  beautiful,  if  the  name  of  the  artist  be  remembered  ; 
the  ideal  of  the  Greek  being  the  perfection  of  the  body, 
that  of  the  Gothic  the  perfection  of  spirit.  But  to  recognise 
this  even  is  not  the  science  of  ^Esthetics.  "  Pour  nous, 
1'esthetique  est  et  ne  peut  etre  que  la  philosophic  de  Part." 
Art  does  not  consist  in  reproducing  or  exactly  imitating 
Nature.  It  must  grasp  and  embody  the  ideal.  "  Le  premier 
but  de  Part  est  done  Pexpression  de  la  pensee  par  la  forme 
ou  la  manifestation  de  Pideal."  The  artist  must  first  con- 
ceive his  ideal  ;  then  he  must  find  in  nature  an  object 
that  corresponds  to  his  ideal,  or  even  surpasses  it.  "  L'ide'al 
artistique  comprend  done  deux  Elements  divers ;  Pideal  de 
la  pensee  et  celui  de  la  forme."  The  power  of  the  imagin- 


134  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

ation  here  asserts  itself,  to  determine  and  complete  the 
ideal  thought,  and  to  give  it  expressive  form.  Imagination 
is  thus  an  intermediary  between  the  ideal,  the  feeling,  and 
the  form.  The  true  artist,  even  when  his  work  is  finished 
in  all  its  beauty,  is  not  satisfied.  "Son  ideal  etait  encore  plus 
beau."  Neither  thought  nor  expression  must  be  sacrificed 
the  one  to  the  other.1 

Ideas  of  the  beautiful,  the  good,  and  the  true  are  innate 
in  us.  "II  faut  de  nouveau  absolument  admettre  que  ces 
meTne  idees  existent  identiquement  en  nous  et  dans  tous  les 
hommes"  (p.  151).  "Ces  ide"es  supe"rieures  a  notre  esprit 
qu'elles  eclairent,  independantes  de  nous  et  de  toute  chose 
creee,  universelles  et  absolues,  s'identifient  avec  Dieu,  qui 
est  le  beau,  le  vrai,  le  bien  infinis  "  (p.  152).  The  idea  of 
Beauty  includes  unity  of  essence,  variety  of  constitutive 
elements,  and  order  which  gives  unity  to  variety  and  mani- 
festation of  life. 

De  Coster  has  a  curious  theory  as  to  the  difference  be- 
tween Beauty  and  Sublimity.  The  sublime  is  not  to  be  con- 
founded with  the  beautiful.  Beauty  is  a  quality  in  the  object, 
while  the  sublime  manifests  itself  in  our  thought.  What  then 
is  the  sublime  ?  "  Lorsque  Phomme  est  devant  un  des 
grands  phenomenes  de  la  nature,  devant  un  acte  d'heroisme, 
de  devoir  accompli,  de  sacrifice  ou  d'abnegation,  devant  une 
haute  conception  de  1'intelligence,  il  se  produit  dans  son 
ame  une  emotion  puissante  qui  la  transporte  dans  le  monde 
superieur  de  la  pensee,  qui  eveille  a  la  fois  une  foule  d'idees 
opposees,  dont  Tune  disparait  devant  1'autre  infiniment  differ- 
ente  ou  plus  grande,  pour  clever  Fesprit,  a  travers  tous  ces 
contraires,  jusqu'a  1'infini  absolu  lui-meme,  Dieu"  (p.  163). 
"  Le  sublime  est  done  une  ardente  aspiration  de  la  pensee  et 

1  "  L'homme  percoit  1'iddal ;  1'artiste  le  determine  dans  un  objet 
con9u  par  1' intelligence,  saisi  par  le  sentiment.  Get  objet  doit  recevoir 
une  forme  qu'il  faut  r^aliser  a  1'exte'rieur.  L'imagination  aidde  de  la 
me'moire  fournit  la  forme  ;  le  gout  la  choisit ;  le  faire  la  realise  au 
moyen  du  precede",  en  imprimant  a  tous  les  elements  de  la  pensee  et 
de  la  forme  un  cachet  purement  personnel.  Mais  dans  toutes  les 
operations  de  1'esprit  et  du  corps,  n^cessaires  depuis  la  conception  de 
1' ideal  jusqu'a  la  realisation  complete  de  1'oeuvre,  toutes  les  faculties 
operent  ensemble,  s'aident,  se  soutiennent,  au  flambeau  de  la  science 
et  de  la  raison  "  (&Uments,  iere  partie,  p.  149). 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  135 

du  sentiment  vers  1'infini,"  In  the  beautiful  there  are  many 
shades  of  difference  —  agreeable,  pretty,  eloquent,  grand, 
majestic,  delicate,  suave,  sweet ;  in  the  sublime  there  are 
no  "nuances."  The  sublime  takes  us  to  the  heights.  "  Le 
sublime  est  une  sur-elevation  de  notre  ame  transported 
d'une  ardente  aspiration  vers  I'infini"  (p.  173).  "  Le  senti- 
ment du  sublime  n'est  done  ni  expansif,  ni  calme  ;  c'est  une 
vive  agitation,  une  sorte  de  vertige  de  Tame  devant  1'abime 
du  neant  de  toute  chose  en  face  de  Dieu  "  (p.  173). 

While  there  is  but  one  idea  of  the  beautiful,  there  are 
divers  kinds  of  beauty.  They  all  conform  to  the  general  idea, 
but  they  are  distinct  the  one  from  the  other.  The  beauty  of 
the  Greek  statues  is  due  to  the  realisation  of  the  ideal  by  the 
artist,  not,  as  some  pretend,  to  the  study  of  beautiful  models. 
To  its  realisation  the  study  of  models  contributed,  but  it  was 
in  virtue  of  their  ideas,  and  their  intelligence  in  embodying 
them,  that  these  artists  were  able  to  draw  from  imperfect 
Nature  that  which  she  never  offered,  viz.  absolute  perfection 
of  form.  Two  orders  of  beauty  result  from  this  realisation 
of  the  ideal  —  "la  beaute  spirituelle  appartenant  a  1'etre 
pensant,  et  la  beaute  sensible,  propre  aux  etres  corporels." 

In  the  third  part  of  his  book,  De  Coster  discusses  the  sub- 
ject of  the  Beautiful  in  Art,  and  affirms  that  in  Art,  beauty 
of  form  is  of  paramount  importance.  Without  this  the  idea 
itself  will  have  lost  its  value.  But  he  goes  on  to  distinguish 
between  a  lower  and  a  higher  kind  of  truth  in  Art,  material 
truth,  and  "  une  verite  superieure  a  celle  que  1'on  trouve 
dans  la  realite."  If  we  only  imitate  the  real,  we  do  not 
reproduce  the  whole  of  the  truth. 

In  1883,  a  year  or  two  after  Coster's  book  appeared,  the 
Abbe  P.  Vallet,  Professor  of  Philosophy  in  the  Seminaire 
d'lvry,  and  author  of  several  speculative  works,  Praelectiones 
Philosophiae^  a  History  of  Philosophy,  and  a  work  on 
Kantism  and  Positivism,  published  Uldee  du  Beau^  dans  la 
philosophic  de  Saint  Thomas  d'Aquin.  Vallet  selects  the 
few  sentences  of  Aquinas  on  Beauty,  all  of  which  he  con- 
siders golden  ones  ;  and,  while  interpreting  them,  he  dis- 
cusses the  whole  subject  of  the  Beautiful  in  the  light  of 
subsequent  theory. 


136  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

In  his  preface  he  says  that  although  Aquinas  has  not 
developed  his  doctrine  of  the  Beautiful  in  the  same  profound 
way  as  that  in  which  he  has  dealt  with  Logic,  Metaphysics, 
and  Ethics,  each  word  that  he  has  let  fall  on  the  subject 
contains  the  germ  of  a  theory,  and  opens  up  immense  horizons 
of  thought.  Esthetic  ought  to  deal  with  three  questions — 
(i)  the  nature  of  Beauty  in  itself,  independent  of  the  subject 
who  perceives  it ;  (2)  the  faculties  in  us  to  which  it  addresses 
itself,  and  the  subjective  effect  it  produces  ;  and  (3)  the 
chief  manifestations  of  the  Beautiful.  In  discussing  the  first 
problem — the  principles  of  Beauty,  and  what  it  is  in  itself — 
Vallet  at  once  quotes  his  master,  Aquinas — "  Resplendentia 
formae  super  partes  materiae  proportionatas  vel  super 
diversas  vires,  vel  actiones "  (Opusc.  de  Pulchro)  ;  which 
he  paraphrases  thus.  The  good  and  the  true  do  not 
need  the  intermediary  of  the  senses  in  the  same  way  that 
the  Beautiful  does.  The  highest  beauty,  however,  includes 
the  idea  of  the  true  and  good ;  but  its  characteristic  is 
splendour.  Human  beauty  does  not  consist  in  that  of  the 
body  only,  or  in  that  of  the  soul  alone ;  but  in  the  intimate 
union  of  both.  Art  must  not  imitate  nature  exactly,  but 
,  also  interpret  and  transfigure.  After  discussing  the  forms 
of  art  with  copious  illustration,  Vallet  concludes  that  the 
highest  expression  of  beauty  has  been  evolved  by  the 
Christian  religion.  "  Voilk  bien  le  corps  illumine  de  toutes 
les  splendeurs  de  1'ame,  la  chair  transfiguree  par  Tesprit, 
en  un  mot  1'ideal  de  la  beaut  e  morale  realise  et  vivant." 

"  Le  beau,  c'est  1'eclat  communique  par  la  forme  aux 
diverses  parties  de  la  matiere,  ou  bien  a  plusieurs  principes, 
a  plusieurs  actions,  harmonieusement  unis  en  un  meme 
tout."  If  one  weighs  each  word  of  this  definition,  one 
finds  that  five  elements  constitute  the  beautiful — "  la  variete, 
1'integrite,  la  proportion,  Tunite',  et  la  splendeur  ou  1'eclat." 

He  proposes  first  to  establish  the  objective  reality  of  the 
beautiful,  and  then  to  show,  with  what  precision  he  can,  "  la 
nature,  le  role  et  la  place  "  of  each  of  the  principles  that 
enter  into  its  composition.  In  discussing  its  objectivity  he 
quotes  Kant's  view  that  Beauty  is  nothing  in  itself  inde- 
pendent of  the  relation  which  it  bears  to  the  subject  who 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  137 

perceives  it.  There  is  therefore  no  science  of  the  Beautiful. 
He  quotes  Schiller  and  Hutcheson  as  agreeing  with  Kant. 
Strange  words,  says  Vallet — we  believe  that,  in  a  lovely  rose, 
a  flowing  symphony,  an  elegant  discourse,  an  act  of  sublime 
devotion,  there  exists  some  secret  virtue  that  allures  us  and 
elevates  us,  and  that  these  things  would  still  preserve  their 
beauty,  even  did  we  not  rejoice  in  them.  He  admits,  how- 
ever, that  the  subjective  element  may  be  greater  in  the 
sphere  of  the  beautiful,  than  in  that  of  the  true  and  the 
good.  To  perceive,  and  above  all  to  taste  the  beautiful, 
there  must  be  the  concurrent  action  of  several  faculties — 
sense,  imagination,  and  reason. 

He  next  analyses  the  five  elements  of  beauty.  (i)| 
Variety  is  necessary,  because  unity  alone  would  weary  us. 
He  gives  an  instance  from  literature.  A  great  master  such 
as  Shakespeare  will  introduce  comedy  into  tragedy  whereby 
tragedy  becomes  more  tragic.  (2)  Completeness,  whole- 
ness, or  integrity  is  indispensable  ;  and  he  mentions  two 
kinds  of  it,  the  one  original,  and  the  other  acquired.  (3) 
So  is  Proportion.  Whatever  adds  to  the  order  and  harmony 
of  anything  perfects  its  raison  d'etre.  (4)  Unity  must  be 
found  underneath  variety,  as  that  which  animates  the  whole. 
But  everything  must  not  be  sacrificed  to  this  unity.  If  the 
unity  is  absolute,  Beauty  is  destroyed.  It  must  be  possible 
to  disentangle  the  principal  idea  from  the  innumerable 
details  which  surround  it,  but  it  must  not  be  presented  naked 
and  solitary;  we  must  still  retain  "Pintegrite,  la  mesure, 
1'harmonie,  le  mouvement,  la  vie"  (p.  79).  In  addition, 
there  is  (5)  perhaps  the  most  difficult,  but  certainly  the 
most  important  element  in  beauty,  viz.  the  eclat,  communi- 
cated by  the  form  to  the  material  substance.  What  is  this  ? 
In  a  word  it  is  the  essence  of  the  thing  itself.  "  L'ide'e  d'un 
etre  n'est  pas  autre  chose  que  le  type  ou  1'ideal  de  cet  etre, 
ideal  qu'il  ne  realisera  jamais  entierement,  mais  dont  il 
doit  s'approcher  le  plus  possible,  afin  d'acquerir  la  plus 
grande  somme  de  beaute  possible"  (p.  82).  "  Le  caract£re 
propre,  la  note  distinctive,  ou  la  difference  specifique  du 
beau,  c'est  la  splendeur  de  la  forme"  (p.  93). 

In  the  second  section  of  his  book  Vallet  discusses  sub- 


138  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

jective  Beauty,  beauty  in  the  mind  of  man.  In  this  we  quit 
the  sphere  of  pure  being  (essence)  for  the  more  accessible 
region  of  phenomena.  Beauty  exists  independent  of  us, 
and  of  every  subject.  It  would  be  the  same,  it  would  pre- 
serve its  characteristic  features  and  its  lustre,  even  should 
there  be  no  spectator  capable  of  apprehending  it.  But,  as 
a  fact,  the  spectator  exists,  longing  to  see  and  to  rejoice  in 
the  sight.  This  spectator  is  man.  Beauty  is  first  appre- 
hended by  the  senses  ;  but  intelligence,  following  after,  dis- 
covers a  beauty  still  more  profound.  We  do  not  credit 
the  senses  with  a  knowledge  of  ideal  beauty,  but  they  are 
the  door  by  which  ideal  beauty  can  enter.  The  voice  of 
Nature  and  of  man,  music,  poetry,  light,  colour,  etc.,  pene- 
trate to  the  soul  through  the  eye  and  the  ear ;  and  there 
must  be  "  concours  des  sens  et  de  la  raison  dans  la  percep- 
tion de  la  beaute  sensible,"  and  again  "  1'intelligence,  pour 
concevoir  le  beau,  a  besoin  d'une  image  sensible." 

In  1882,  E.  Krantz  wrote  an  Essai  sur  VEsthetique  de 
Descartes.  The  aim  of  this  book  is  to  show  that  the 
classical  literature  of  France  in  the  seventeenth  century  was 
the  aesthetic  outcome  or  expression  of  Cartesian  doctrine  ; 
and  that,  although  Descartes  said  nothing  of  the  Beautiful,  he 
nevertheless  impressed  on  the  intellectual  spirit  of  his  time 
a  certain  type  of  beauty  that  was  original  and  authoritative  ; 
and  further,  that  the  indirect  influence  of  the  founder  of 
French  philosophy  was  really  more  fertile  of  result  than  that 
of  the  direct  teachers  of  ^Esthetic  who  succeeded  him,  and 
who  formulated  theories  of  art  which  were  never  consecrated 
by  success.  It  is  an  extremely  able  treatise,  though  some- 
what diffuse  in  its  details. 


9.  Guyau,  etc. 

A  remarkably  brilliant  and  suggestive  writer,  Jean  Marie 
Guyau  (1854-1888),  whose  recent  death  was  a  great  loss  to 
the  philosophical  literature  of  France,  was  appointed  in  his 
twentieth  year  lecturer  on  Philosophy  in  the  Lycee  Con- 
dorcet  at  Paris.  In  1884  he  published  a  somewhat 
remarkable  work  on  the  Beautiful,  which  he  called  Les 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  139 

Problemes  de  VEsthetique  Contemporaine.  It  is  to  a  large 
extent  a  reply  to  Schiller's  doctrine  of  the  spiel-treib,  as 
developed  by  Mr.  Spencer.  He  contends  that  Beauty  has 
its  source  in  what  is  both  natural  and  essential  in  the 
development  of  the  function  of  living  beings.  His  book  is 
a  protest  (perhaps  at  times  too  emphatic)  against  the 
materialistic  and  evolutionary  solution  of  the  problem.  A 
very  sympathetic  and  interesting  account  of  Guyau  was 
written  in  1889  by  his  step-father,  M.  Alfred  Fouillee,  La 
Morale^  VArt  et  la  Religion  d'apres  M.  Guyau.  The 
following  is  an  outline  of  Guyau's  teaching  on  aesthetics. 

He  regards  the  notion  of  the  evolutionists  that  beauty 
can  be  explained  by  the  mechanical  laws  of  motion,  and  is 
due  to  them,  as  superficial.  Some  motor  must  be  recog- 
nised, as  well  as  the  movement  which  results ;  and  to  find 
an  adequate  explanation  of  this  we  must  rise  to  the  sphere 
of  the  will  and  the  emotions.  The  beautiful  may  be 
defined  either  as  a  perception,  or  an  action,  that  stimulates 
our  life,  whether  through  the  senses,  the  intellect,  or  the  will, 
at  one  and  the  same  time,  and  produces  pleasure  by  the 
rapid  consciousness  of  such  stimulation.  According  to  Mr. 
Spencer  and  his  school,  the  idea  of  beauty  excludes  (i)  that 
which  is  necessary  to  life,  (2)  that  which  is  useful  to  life, 
and  (3)  that  which  is  an  object  of  desire  and  possession. 
But,  according  to  M.  Guyau,  beauty  restoring  to  us  the  full 
consciousness  of  life  cannot  exclude  that  which  is  necessary 
to  it.  On  the  contrary,  the  first  manifestation  of  aesthetic 
feeling  is  need  satisfied,  life  regaining  its  equilibrium,  and 
the  consequent  renewal  (renaissance)  of  inward  harmony. 
Again,  instead  of  excluding  the  idea  of  utility,  beauty 
presupposes  the  idea  of  a  will  spontaneously  adjusting 
means  to  ends,  an  activity  that  seeks  to  attain  its  end  with 
the  least  expenditure  of  force.  Yet  again,  Beauty,  instead 
of  being  something  exterior  to  the  thing  in  which  we  see  it, 
as  a  sort  of  parasitic  plant,  is  the  very  blossoming  of  the 
being  in  which  it  is  seen,  the  very  flower  of  life. 

In  a  subsequent  chapter  (Book  II.  ch.  i.)  on  the  antag- 
onism between  the  scientific  spirit  and  the  imagination, 
Guyau  discusses  the  question  whether  the  progress  of 


140  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

science  and  the  development  of  the  scientific  spirit  will  end 
in  destroying  the  faculty  essential  to  the  artist,  viz.  the 
imagination.  He  refers  to  the  opinion  of  such  writers  as 
Schelling  and  Wagner  that  there  can  be  no  poetry  without 
mystery,  or  even  superstition,  as  he  thinks  Goethe  held. 
As  mist  enhances  the  beauty  of  a  landscape — and  if  the 
mist  be  removed,  the  beauty  vanishes — so  it  is  with  Poetry 
and  Nature.  Not  so,  says  Guyau.  The  opposition  between 
poetry  and  science  is  more  apparent  than  real.  "  La 
poesie  aura  toujours  sa  raison  d'etre  a  cote  de  la  science." 
The  savant  may  desire  to  abstract  his  own  personality  from 
the  objects  of  his  research,  but  the  human  heart  is  part 
mistress  of  the  world.  A  necessary  harmony  therefore 
exists  between  man  and  the  things  of  the  world.  The  poet 
takes  cognisance  of  the  harmony.  It  is  no  more  possible 
to  take  our  heart  from  the  world  than  it  is  possible  to 
drive  out  the  world  from  our  heart.  All  the  theories  of 
astronomy  cannot  prevent  the  sight  of  the  infinite  heavens 
from  filling  us  with  a  vague  restlessness,  a  desire  that  is  not 
satisfied  by  knowledge.  There  is  always  an  eternal  sug- 
gestion, consequently  an  eternal  poetry.  The  higher  we  rise, 
and  enlarge  our  view,  we  lose  some  of  the  poetry  of  detail ; 
small  things  vanish  from  our  sight,  but  what  breadth  there 
is  around  us  !  Still  girdled  by  shadows,  we  enlarge  our 
horizons,  and  the  need  grows  within  us  to  see  farther,  and 
to  know  more.  But  beyond  us  there  is  ever  a  mystery  which 
science  cannot  destroy,  a  mystery  that  will  remain  as  the 
theme  of  poetry.  "  C'est  le  mystere  metaphysique."  This 
mystery  rests,  not  on  known  laws,  but  on  the  unknowable. 

Guyau  has  also  written  a  volume  on  the  ethics  of 
Epicurus,  and  one  on  English  contemporary  ethics.  At 
his  death  he  left  three  other  books  behind  him  for  pos- 
thumous publication,  one  of  which  he  called  LlArt  au 
Point  de  vue  sociologique.  In  an  earlier  work — which  he 
called  Ulrreligion  de  VAvenir — he  expounded  the  socio- 
logical idea  which  he  thought  underlay  religion.  In  the 
later  he  desired  to  prove  that  the  same  idea  is  to  be 
found  at  the  root  of  Art ;  and  that  through  it  Art  is  allied 
to  religion,  metaphysics,  and  morals.  The  recognition 


ix  The  Philosophy  of  France  141 

of  this  social  idea  as  a  fundamental  truth  is,  according  to 
Guyau,  the  keynote  of  the  nineteenth  century.  It  is  not 
enough  that  thought,  action,  and  will  converge  toward  one 
end,  in  what  he  calls  "  la  synergic  sociale."  To  this  must 
be  added  "  la  sympathie  sociale,"  to  produce  which  is  the 
function  of  Art.  Art  has  to  raise  the  individual  from  his ' 
own  life  to  the  life  universal,  not  only  by  a  participation  in 
the  same  ideas  and  beliefs,  but  also  by  community  of  feel- 
ing and  sentiment.  All  hearts  should  vibrate  to  the  same 
music.  To  think  alike  is  much  ;  but  to  enable  us  to  feel 
alike  is  the  miracle  which  Art  accomplishes. 

Art  must  realise  two  conditions.  The  sensations  and 
sentiments  it  awakens  must  have  a  character  both  of 
intensity  and  of  expansiveness.  Consequently  they  must  be 
social.  "La  solidarite  sociale  est  le  principe  de  Pemotion 
esthetique  la  plus  haute  et  la  plus  complexe."  Great  art- 
exercises  its  power  over  a  great  area.  By  its  simplicity 
and  sincerity  it  can  move  all  intelligent  beings  ;  by  its 
depth  it  can  stir  the  elect.  The  great  artist,  filled  himselt 
with  extraordinary  intensity  of  life,  can  only  satisfy  himself 
by  creating  a  new  world  of  living  beings  ;  and  in  the  life- 
likeness  of  the  artist's  work  we  find  the  force  that  makes  it 
sympathetic.  Life,  if  it  is  even  that  of  an  inferior  being, 
interests  us  from  the  sole  fact  that  it  is  life  ;  even  the  anti- 
pathetic may  become  to  a  certain  extent  sympathetic  in 
becoming  a  reality  that  seems  to  say  to  us,  "  Je  suis  ce  que  je 
suis,  et,  telle  que  je  suis,  telle  j'apparais  "  (p.  67).  Replying 
to  Victor  Hugo,  who  had  said  that  emotion  is  always  new, 
Guyau  asserted  that  emotion  is  not  new,  but  that  it  has  an 
eternal  spring  ;  its  freshness  is  like  that  of  the  morning, 
like  the  dawn.  "Life,"  says  Guyau,  "morality,  science,' 
art,  religion, — there  is,  as  I  believe,  an  absolute  unity 
between  these  things.  Great  and  serious  art  is  that  which 
maintains  and  manifests  this  unity." 

Such  is  a  bare  outline  of  the  philosophic  thought  of  a 
very  suggestive  writer  on  aesthetics. 

La  Critique  Scientifique,  by  E.  Hennequin,  appeared  in 
1888,  and  is  an  extreme  application  of  the  principles  of 
M.  Taine  to  criticism.  Throughout  his  literary  analysis 


142  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful     CHAP,  ix 

the  author  is  in  search  of  aesthetic,  psychological,  and  socio- 
logical data,  and  he  regards  his  method  as  purely  scientific, 
since  causes  are  sought  behind  facts,  and  laws  traced  be- 
neath phenomena.  Works  of  Art  are  "  les  indices  de  Tame 
des  artistes  et  de  1'ame  des  peuples."  After  explaining  his 
method  he  applies  it  to  Victor  Hugo,  finding  in  him  a 
synthesis  of  the  aesthetic,  psychologic,  and  sociological 
tendencies  of  the  nineteenth  century.  One-third  of  the 
volume  deals  with  aesthetics,  the  remainder  with  the 
psychological  and  sociological  aspects  of  Literature. 

In  1889,  Charles  Benard,  Professor  of  Philosophy  in  a 
Lycee,  etc.,  of  Paris,  who  about  a  quarter  of  a  century 
earlier  translated  Hegel's  Aesthetik  into  French,  published 
L  Esthetique  d*Aristote,  et  de  ses  Successeurs.  He  thinks 
that  Aristotle  was  the  wisest  writer  on  ./Esthetic  amongst 
the  Greeks.  Although  Plato  had  a  deeper  vision  as  to 
the  nature  of  Beauty,  Aristotle  had  a  wider  grasp  of 
its  relations,  and  consequently  of  its  place  amongst  the 
sciences.  M.  Benard' s  book  contains  much  information  as 
to  the  history  of  ^Esthetics  in  the  Aristotelian  and  post- 
Aristotelian  schools,  down  to  the  Neoplatonists. 

Le  Realisme  et  le  Naturalisme,  by  David  Sauvagart 
(1890),  is  an  original  work  of  merit ;  and -there  are  many 
articles  of  great  interest  on  the  subject  of  the  Beautiful  in 
the  French  Revue  Philosophique,  which  was  started  in  1876, 
and  has  done  much  the  same  service  to  Philosophy  in  France, 
as  Mind  has  done  in  England,  and  the  Journal  of  Specula- 
tive Philosophy  in  America.  Amongst  them  the  following 
may  be  noted  : — Descours  di  Tournoy  (Giuseppe)  Del  Vero, 
del  Bella,  e  del  Bene  ;  La  Physiologie  du  Beau,  a  review  of 
S.  A.  Byck's  (of  Leipzig)  Die  Physiologie  des  Schbnen ; 
La  Science,  et  la  Beaute,  a  criticism  of  Eugene  Veron's 
LEsthetique,  by  G.  Seailles  ;  Le  probleme  du  Beau,  by 
B.  Carneri.  The  last  arose  out  of  a  German  translation, 
by  J.  Kirkmann,  of  a  condensation  of  part  of  Comte's 
Cours  de  philosophie  positive,  by  M.  Jules  Rig. 


CHAPTER    X 

THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF   ITALY 

I.  Leon  Battista  Alberti  to  J.  P.  Bettor i 

THE  course  of  philosophic  thought  on  the  subject  of  the 
Beautiful  has  been  more  mixed  up  with  the  progress  of  the 
Arts  in  Italy,  than  in  any  other  European  country.  Through- 
out the  modern  period  beginning  with  the  Cinquecento 
Renaissance  the  artistic  has  been  the  dominant  Italian  im- 
pulse ;  Philosophy  and  Science  have  been  quite  secondary. 
There  were  reflections,  and  casual  discussions,  on  the  theory 
of  the  Arts  ;  but  there  was  no  philosophic  speculation  on 
the  subject  of  Beauty  till  the  present  century. 

The  earliest  Italian  writers  on  the  subject  did  not  use 
the  term  "estetica."  As  we  have  already  seen,  the  word  was 
introduced  into  Europe  with  a  new  meaning,  when  Baum- 
garten  naturalised  it  in  Germany ;  but  in  describing  the 
methods  and  aims  of  Painting,  Sculpture,  and  Architecture, 
many  writers  discussed  the  principles  of  Art.  For  example, 
Leon  Battista  Alberti's  (i4oo?-i485)  tracts,  De pictura  and 
De  re  cedificatoria,  were  written  in  1435.  They  were  the 
first,  and  are  perhaps  the  most  important  writings  of  the 
early  Italian  renaissance.  Although  they  do  not  cast  much 
light  on  art-theory,  they  have  gone  through  many  editions, 
and  have  been  translated  into  Italian,  English,  French,  and 
German.  Alberti's  tracts  are  to  be  found  in  Eitelberger  von 
Edelburg's  Quellenschriften,vQ\.  xi.  (Wien,  1877).  In  vol.  ix. 
of  the  same  series  is  Francesco  Bocchi's  tract,  of  1571,  on 
the  St.  George  of  Donatello  ;  an  extremely  interesting  work 


144  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

on  Art-theory,  considering  its  date.  In  Leonardo  da  Vinci's 
(1452-1519)  Trattato  della  Pittura  there  is  a  discussion — 
especially  interesting  as  his — on  beauty  of  Form  and  beauty 
of  Colour,  also  as  to  what  gradation  or  shade  in  a  colour  is 
most  beautiful.  Unfortunately,  however,  his  treatise  con- 
tains nothing  as  to  the  principles  of  Beauty  itself.  An 
interesting  version  of  Da  Vinci's  book  has  been  given  in 
German,  by  H.  Ludwig,  from  a  late  MS.  copy  of  the 
Trattato,  now  in  the  Vatican.  It  was  published  in  the 
Vienna  Quellenschriften  by  Von  Edelburg  in  1877. 

In  his  Traite  du  Beau  (ch.  vii.  p.  190)  Crousaz  refers  to 
Augustin  Niphus,  who  wrote  a  work  under  the  same  title. 
He  was  born  at  Jopoli  about  1453,  and  died  at  Jena  in 
1538,  and  seems  to  have  been  Professor  of  Philosophy  at 
Naples,  Parma,  and  Rome,  also  at  Pisa  and  Bologna.  He 
wrote  a  work  on  Auguries.  In  his  book  on  Beauty  he 
distinguished  three  different  types  and  consequent  tastes 
for  it — (i)  Intellectual  Beauty,  (2)  Sensational  Beauty,  and 

(3)  an    intermediate    type    between    the    intellectual    and 
sensational. 

In  the  Graeco-Roman  chapter  reference  has  already 
been  made  to  Vitruvius  (see  p.  40).  Leon  Battista  Alberti 
looked  to  him  as  his  master ;  and  so,  though  less  explicitly, 
did  Peruzzi  and  Palladio.  But  perhaps  the  most  important 
link  between  the  De  Architectura  of  Vitruvius  and  the  modern 
books  of  Mr.  Hay  (who  reverted  to  him  explicitly)  is  the 
Harmonices  Mundi  of  the  astronomer  Kepler.  This  book 
(which  was  dedicated  to  James  I.  of  England)  was  published 
in  1619,  and  is  divided  into  five  chapters,  entitled  respect- 
ively— (i)  Geometricus,  (2)  Architectonicus,  (3)  Harmonicus, 

(4)  Metaphysicus,  and  (5)  Astronomicus  and  Metaphysicus. 
In  it  the  principle  of  symmetry  or  proportion  is  recognised 
as  running  through  all  things,  and  resulting  in  "  the  music 
of  the  spheres."     The  relations  of  musical  and  figure  har- 
mony are  discussed,  and  this  is  a  strict  development  of  the 
principle   of  Vitruvius,  by  whom  the   principles   of  music 
were  applied  to  architecture. 

The  work  of  an  Italian  writer,  J.  P.  Bellori  (1616-1691), 
must  not  be  overlooked  at  this  stage.  Bellori  was  a  Roman 


x  The  Philosophy  of  Italy  145 

antiquary,  an  authority  on  coins,  inscriptions  on  ancient 
monuments,  icones,  etc.,  who  wrote  a  book  Le  vite  di 
Pittori,  Scultori,  ed  Architetti  moderni  (1672).  In  it  he 
deals  with  the  lives  and  works  of  such  men  as  the  Carracci, 
Michael  Angelo,  Rubens,  Vandyke,  etc.  ;  but  in  a  preface 
he  discourses  on  "the  Idea  in  Painting,  Sculpture,  and 
Architecture,  etc."  Bellori  was  a  modern  Platonist,  an 
extreme  idealist,  with  crotchets  of  his  own.  He  held 
that  Nature  always  strove  after  perfect  or  ideal  Beauty, 
but  never  realised  it,  because  of  the  imperfection  of  the 
material  through  which  it  worked ;  and  that  therefore 
all  the  highest  artists  formed  an  ideal  of  their  own.  He 
glorifies  this  idea  in  language  which,  if  too  rhetorical,  is  in 
substance  Platonic.  "The  idea,  which  we  may  call  the 
goddess  of  Painting  and  of  Sculpture,  descends  upon  the 
marble  and  the  canvas,  and  becomes  the  original  of  these 
arts.  Being  measured  by  the  compass  of  the  intellect,  it . 
is  itself  the  measure  of  the  performing  hand  ;  and,  being 
assimilated  by  the  imagination,  it  infuses  life  into  the  image." 
He  affirms  that  in  Nature  no  individual  thing  is  perfect,  and! 
therefore  that  the  true  artist  frames  a  Beauty  which  we  cannot' 
find  in  any  single  object.  Nature  is  thus  "  inferior  to  Art." 
The  higher  artist  does  not  paint  men  as  they  are,  but  as 
they  ought  to  be.  He  "  advances  Art  above  Nature  itself." 
Bellori  quotes  Phidias,  Apollonius  Tyaneus,  Leon  Battista 
Alberti,  Da  Vinci,  and  Raphael,  as  all  on  his  side.  He 
cites  Raphael's  letter  to  Castiglione  about  his  Galatea : 
"  To  paint  the  fair,  it  is  not  necessary  that  I  see  many  fair 
ones  ;  but,  because  there  is  so  great  a  scarcity  of  beautiful 
women,  I  am  bound  to  make  use  of  an  idea  which  I  have 
formed  to  myself  of  my  own  fancy."  Similarly,  Guido  Reni 
— writing  to  M.  Massano,  steward  of  Pope  Urban  VIII., 
when  sending  him  his  picture  of  St.  Michael  for  the  church 
of  the  Capuchins  at  Rome — said  :  "  Not  being  able  to  mount 
so  high  as  to  behold  my  Archangel,  I  was  forced  to  make 
an  introspection  of  my  own  mind,  and  that  idea  of  Beauty, 
which  I  have  formed  in  my  own  imagination."  It  is  to  be 
noted  that  Bellori  recognised  the  various  types  of  Beauty, 
and  their  compatibility  with  one  standard  of  the  Beautiful. 

L 


146  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 


2.  Rosmini  to  Mamiani 

Italy  was  but  slightly  influenced  by  the  stream  of  modern 
thought  which,  originating  with  Bacon  and  Descartes,  so 
powerfully  affected  England,  Germany,  France,  and  Hol- 
land. It  was  natural  that  mediaeval  tradition  should  rule 
the  centre  of  Catholicism,  much  longer  than  it  controlled 
the  rest  of  Europe.  Galileo  represented  a  scientific  move- 
ment, and  Vico  a  philosophical  one.  The  latter  shed  a  new 
light  on  the  first  half  of  the  eighteenth  century  in  Italy; 
but,  like  Erigena  in  his  age,  he  stood  alone.  The  French 
"  enlightenment  "  passed  over  the  Italian  soil  without  taking 
root,  although  for  some  years  it  dazzled  the  imagination  of 
a  few.  Condillac  had  spent  ten  years  in  Italy  while  tutor 
to  Prince  Ferdinand  of  Parma,  and  did  something  to  give 
it  temporary  favour.  Even  in  the  earlier  decades  of  the 
'nineteenth  century  a  doctrine  of  experience — a  modification 
of  Locke's,  somewhat  resembling  that  of  Reid,  and  what 
used  to  be  known  as  the  Scotch  school — was  taught  by 
Pasquale  Galuppi  (1770-1846)  in  his  Saggio  Filosofico  and 
Sulla  Critica  della  Conoscenza  (1819).  Starting  from  a 
psychological  basis,  he  was  a  realist,  but  yet  a  spiritualist. 
He  did  not  deal,  however,  with  the  problems  of  the  Beauti- 
ful, and  the  four  Italian  writers  on  the  subject  in  the  earlier 
years  of  the  present  century — M.  Delfico,  in  his  Nuove 
Ricerche  sul  Bello  (1818),  Talia  in  his  Principii  di  Estetica 
(1827),  G.  Venanzio  in  his  Callafilia  (1830),  G.  Longhi 
in  his  Callagraphia  (1830),  and  Ermes  Visconti  in  his 
Saggi  sul  Bello  (1835) — all  give  an  empirical  solution  of 
the  problem.  None  of  them  were  authors  of  any  import- 
ance, and  they  did  not  really  influence  their  time. 

The  chief  philosophers  of  modern  Italy  have  been  Ros- 
mini, Gioberti,  and  Mamiani,  and  it  is  noteworthy  that  they 
were  not  merely  recluse  speculative  thinkers,  but  were  men 
of  affairs  as  well,  intensely  interested  in  the  progress  of 
their  country,  and  in  sympathy  with  the  political  aspirations 
of  the  Italian  race  ;  while  they  saw  in  the  development  of 
Philosophy  one  of  the  most  important  elements  in  the 


x  The  Philosophy  of  Italy  147 

national  life.  They  did  not,  however,  break  with  the  Church. 
Their  chief  studies  were  at  patristic  and  mediaeval  sources, 
but  to  the  philosophical  theology  of  scholasticism  they  added 
some  ideas  that  were  more  ancient,  and  others  that  were 
more  modern. 

The  nineteenth-century  philosophy  of  Italy  dates  from 
Antonio    Rosmini-Serbati    of    Rovereto    (1797-1855)    and 
begins  about   1830.      It  was  fundamentally  an  attempt  to 
bring   the   Platonic  view   of  the   universe,    as   transmitted 
through  the  later  mediaeval   Idealism,   into  harmony  with 
the  modern  philosophy  of  Europe.     Rosmini  was  a  Kantian, 
but  the  ideal  indeterminate  existence,  the  Di?ig-an-sich>  was  to 
him  a  divine  element  which  mediated  between  our  minds  and 
particular  determined  phenomenal  objects.     He  brought  into 
his  philosophy  a  quasi-Malebranchian  doctrine  of  seeing  all 
things  in  God.     He  wrote  no  treatise  on  the  Beautiful,  but 
his  detached  speculations  on  the  subject  were  collected  and 
published  in  two  volumes  in  1870  (Letteratura  e  Arti  Belle), 
and  his  theory  on  the  subject  is  worked  out  in  his  Teosofia 
(1859),   Book  III.  §  4,  ch.  x.     To  him  ^Esthetics  was  a 
subsection   of  a  wider  science   of  the  Beautiful,  and  was 
the  doctrine  of  the  Beautiful  as  seen  in  the  sensible  world, 
Beauty  is  an  objective  fact,  the  attribute  of  an  object  beyond  r 
us,  as  Truth  is  beyond  us  ;  while  Goodness  is  rather  con-i 
trasted  with  it,  as  an  attribute  within  us — an  attribute,  not  of 
the  object  but  of  the  subject.      The  beautiful  is  also  con-i 
trasted  with  the  true  in  this  respect  that  it  implies  four 
elements  in  addition,  viz.  "  unity,  multiplicity,  totality,"  and 
(what  Rosmini  most  illogically  introduces  along  with  them) 
"  mental  approval,"  or  the   subjective   delight  experienced 
by  us  in  recognising  the  other  three  elements.      It  is  the 
objective  element  of  Beauty  that  determines  its  approval  or 
recognition  by  us.     Rosmini  held  that  what  is  beautiful  to 
us  subjectively  is  created  by  the  action  upon  us  of  what  is 
objectively  beautiful ;  and  we  realise  Beauty  chiefly  in  the 
objective  world  of  sense,   because  we  are   ourselves  both 
body  and  spirit.      It  is  in  the  world  of  the  real  that  we 
discern  it ;  but  we  at  the  same  time  aspire  after  the  ideal, 
after  what  transcends  the  actual.     In  doing  so,  a  new  feeling 


148  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

is  evoked,  and  a  new  aspect  of  the  universe  is  discerned. 
We  recognise  the  sublime ;  and,  instead  of  the  tranquil 
pleasure  which  the  beautiful  yields,  we  have  the  enthusiasm 
which  the  sublime  evokes. 

A  few  years  after  Rosmini  published  his  book  on  the 
Origin  of  Ideas,  the  influence  of  the  idealistic  movement 
which  he  championed  was  seen  in  two  minor  books  on  the 
Beautiful,  viz.  G.  Zuccala's  Principii  di  Estetica  (1835) 
and  P.  Lichtental's  Estetica  (1836).  These  writers  find  the 
essence  of  the  Beautiful,  not  in  anything  conventional, 
accidental,  or  associated,  but  in  a  reality  within  the  ideal 
sphere ;  the  real  being  known  adequately  only  through  the 
ideal. 

Vincenzo  Gioberti  (1801-1852)  is  the  second  in  the 
triumvirate  of  the  modern  philosophers  of  Italy.  He  is  the 
typical  ontologist  of  Italian  philosophy.  He  wrote  his 
principal  works  when  in  exile,  and  when  he  was  under  the 
influence  both  of  Hegel  and  of  Schelling  amongst  the 
Germans.  (Some  have  thought  of  him  as  a  sort  of  Italian 
Schelling,  but  this  is  an  exaggeration.)  He  was  an  ontolo- 
gist pure  and  simple.  He  abjured  equally  the  psychological 
method  of  Descartes,  the  individualistic  appeal  to  self- 
consciousness,  and  the  abstract  ideality  of  Rosmini.  He 
held  that  we  cannot  reach  the  realm  of  real  existence, 
either  through  the  contingent  facts  of  consciousness  (as 
Descartes  attempted),  or  through  the  idealistic  assumptions 
with  which  Rosmini  started,  but  that  we  must  begin  with 
the  object  as  comprehending  within  it  all  existence.  The 
radical  proposition  of  Gioberti's  philosophy  was  therefore 
Ens  creat  existentias  (Being  creates  existences)  ;  and  there- 
fore Science,  instead  of  being,  as  Bacon  and  Descartes  and 
all  their  successors  had  maintained,  a  process  of  inductive 
study  by  experiment  a  posteriori,  is  a  sort  of  a  priori  reading 
of  the  facts  of  the  universe,  given  ontologically  in  our  know- 
ledge of  the  Absolute. 

In  1841,  Gioberti  wrote  an  article  on  the  Beautiful  for  an 
Italian  encyclopaedia,  which  was  in  the  same  year  published 
by  itself  as  Trattato  del  Bello.  In  this  work  he  proclaims 
himself  a  disciple  of  Plato,  and  he  follows  Plato  in  the  way 


x  The  Philosophy  of  Italy  149 

in  which  he  discusses  the  subject  (seeking  in  the  Beautiful 
and  the  Good  types  of  the  moral  and  the  political),  as  well 
as  in  the  conclusions  he  reaches.  He  examines  the  radical 
idea  of  the  Beautiful,  and  seeks  its  origin.  He  discusses  the 
function  of  the  imagination,  and  distinguishes  the  Beautiful 
from  the  Sublime,  the  Sublime  being  merely  the  superior 
principle  of  Beauty.  He  traces  its  manifestations  in  the 
sphere  of  Nature  and  of  Art,  and  takes  a  rapid  review  of 
the  history  of  the  doctrine  of  Beauty. 

Gioberti  makes  ontology,  not  psychology,  the  basis  of  his 
doctrine  of  Beauty.  Thinking  that  the  modern  psycho- 
logical movement  had  injured  philosophy,  he  reverted  to 
the  Greek  and  the  mediaeval  ontology.  The  starting-point 
of  his  method  and  the  first  principle  of  his  system  was,  as 
already  mentioned,  not  the  Cogito  ergo  sum  of  Descartes, 
but  his  own  Ens  creat  existentias.  He  thought  he  could 
thus  unite  the  real  and  the  ideal,  and  deduce  all  the  sciences 
from  his  primary  maxim,  the  three  terms  of  which  were  the 
roots  of  all  knowledge.  The  "  ens "  gave  him  Ontology 
and  Theology ;  the  "  creat "  yielded  him  Logic,  Ethics, 
^Esthetics,  and  Mathematics  ;  and  the  "  existentias "  sup- 
plied him  with  Psychology,  Cosmology,  and  the  Physical 
Sciences.  It  is  a  wholly  chimerical  scheme. 

To  Gioberti,  Beauty  is  neither  the  agreeable  nor  the  \ 
useful.  It  is  not  a  purely  subjective  phenomenon,  de-[ 
pendent  on  the  idiosyncrasy  of  individuals.  It  is  an  object- 
ive, though  an  ideal,  reality,  and  is  in  its  essence  absolute. 
In  Nature  we  must  distinguish  form  from  matter.  In  Art 
it  is  even  more  necessary  to  distinguish  that  which  belongs 
to  imagination  from  that  which  depends  on  reason,  as  the 
one  furnishes  us  with  a  sensible,  and  the  other  with  an 
intellectual  element.  In  the  products  of  Art,  Beauty  shows 
itself  most  clearly  when  an  ideal  type  dominates  over  the 
sensible  element.  But  the  radical  idea  of  Beauty  is  to  be 
found  in  the  idea  of  Being  considered  in  itself,  in  its  unity,  and 
in  its  manifestations  en  rapport  with  existence.  To  know 
both  the  principle  and  the  development  of  Beauty,  and  the 
highest  rules  of  aesthetics,  we  must  seek  them  in  the  universal 
laws  of  ontology.  There  is  uninterrupted  continuity  in  the  . 


150  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

chain  of  existence,  from  the  impenetrable  essence  of  unity 
to  the  last  ramifications  of  multiplicity.  The  elementary 
ideas  of  aesthetic  are  contained  in  the  postulates  of  ontology. 
These  ideas  are  those  of  the  sublime,  the  beautiful,  and  the 
marvellous. 

"The  idea  of  creation,"  says  Gioberti,  "furnishes  us 
with  the  three  simultaneous  conceptions  of  Time,  Space, 
and  Force,  which,  together  or  separate,  form  the  different 
species  of  the  sublime.  The  sublime  is  creation,  so  far  as 
it  is  represented  to  the  imagination  ;  as  creation  is  the 
sublime,  in  so  far  as  it  is  realised  by  God  and  perceived 
by  the  reason.  That  premised,  it  will  not  be  difficult  to 
find  the  relation  of  the  sublime  to  the  beautiful.  What  is 
creation  if  not  the  realisation  of  the  intelligible  types  of 
things  in  finite  substance  ;  and  what  does  the  creative  act 
do,  if  not  to  adjust  matter  in  its  substantiality,  and  form 
according  to  its  ideal  ?  Beauty  is  the  union  of  form  and 
matter.  .  .  .  It  is  derived  from  the  creative  force  in  which 
the  sublime  principally  resides."  In  the  second  place, 
intelligible  types,  in  so  far  as  they  are  realised  in  finite 

;'  substances,  exist  in  time  and  space ;  whence  it  follows  that 
these  two  forms  of  the  Universe  (which  constitute  another 
aspect  of  the  sublime)  are  also  the  seat  of  Beauty.  Thus 
f  creative  force  produces  beauty,  space  and  time  contain  it. 
)  Towards  Beauty  the  one  has  a  relation  of  causality,  the 
'  other  a  relation  of  containedness,  whence  the  formula, 
"The  sublime  creates  and  contains  the  Beautiful,"  which  is 
equivalent  to  this  other,  "The  sublime  dynamic  creates  the 
Beautiful,  the  sublime  mathematic  contains  it."  But,  as  the 
creative  force  is  only  the  all-powerful  activity  of  Being, 
and  since  Time  and  Space  are  its  conditions  and  effects,  it 
follows  that  the  formulas  of  aesthetics  can  spread  themselves 
out  as  formulas  of  ontology  thus  :  "  Being,  by  means  of  the 
dynamic  sublime  creates  the  Beautiful,  and  by  means  of 
the  mathematic  sublime  contains  it."  Such  is  the  relation 
between  aesthetics  and  ontology,  as  to  the  ideas  of  the 
beautiful  and  sublime. 

Similarly  with  the  relation  of  the  beautiful  to  the  wonder- 
ful. The  wonderful  is  of  two  kinds,  the  mysterious  and  the 


x  The  Philosophy  of  Italy  151 

supernatural.  The  latter  is  the  unknown,  which,  mingling 
itself  with  the  known  under  a  sensible  form,  allies  itself 
with  the  beautiful  and  the  sublime,  and  adds  to  its  own 
eclat.  Entering  the  realm  of  the  imagination,  it  brings  in 
a  floating  indefinable  something,  which  expresses  itself  in 
the  ideal  world  of  art  and  poetry.  Mystery  is  necessary  to 
beauty,  because  the  Beautiful  is  inseparable  from  the  objects 
which  transcend  experience,  and  which  open  up,  beyond 
the  real  world,  an  infinite  perspective  to  the  mind.  Mystery 
is  also  found  in  science,  where  the  light  of  truth  burns 
with  keener  brilliance  by  contrast  with  the  shadows  which 
attend  it. 

The  supernatural  in  aesthetics  is  not  less  important.  It 
is  not  the  extraordinary,  it  is  rather  the  superior  condition, 
which,  within  the  world  or  beyond  it,  begins,  continues,  and 
transforms  the  order  of  things.  .  .  .  The  incomprehensible, 
in  passing  from  the  domain  of  reason  to  that  of  imagination, 
and  clothing  itself  with  the  raiment  of  appearance,  gives 
rise  to  the  notion  of  the  mysterious.  It  follows  that  every 
partial  disclosure  of  the  incomprehensible  essence  must  be 
mysterious,  and  must  possess  beauty.  The  indeterminate 
determines  itself  in  forms,  colours,  sounds,  motions,  words, 
which  are  to  us  points  of  light  on  a  field  of  darkness. 

It  will  be  seen  from  the  foregoing  summary  of  his  views, 
that  although  the  root-principle  of  Gioberti's  philosophy  of 
Aesthetik  may  be  quite  erroneous,  there  is  a  great  deal 
of  suggestive  thinking  in  his  discussion  of  the  subject. 

The  third  in  the  modern  Italian  triumvirate,  Count 
Terenzio  Mamiani — perhaps  the  most  remarkable  of  the 
three — has  not  specially  discussed  the  Beautiful ;  but  it  is 
worthy  of  note  that,  although  Mamiani  began  his  philoso- 
phical career  by  defending  the  experience  doctrine,  while  an 
exile  in  France  in  1834,  he  worked  himself  gradually  clear 
of  it,  into  an  idealism  that  is  both  catholic  and  cosmopolitan. 
He  was  a  poet  as  well  as  a  philosopher,  and  his  mind  has 
received  vivid  impress  from  his  art  studies,  and  from  the 
movement  of  which  Alfieri  is  perhaps  the  chief  representa- 
tive. Mamiani  is  a  Platonist,  but  he  has  tried  to  unite 
Platonism  with  the  Aristotelian  doctrine,  in  his  recognition 


152  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful       CHAP,  x 

of  the  Absolute  as  within  the  relative,  and  is  thus  able  to 
endorse  the  ontological  position  of  St.  Anselm.  It  is  easy 
to  see  that  his  doctrine  of  the  Beautiful  was  a  Platonic 
one ;  and  his  name  is  introduced  into  this  historic  essay 
chiefly  because  one  of  his  disciples — Luigi  Ferri,  of  Naples 
— has  written  an  Essai  sur  Vhistoire  de  la  philosophic  en 
Italic  au  dix-neuvieme  siecle  (1869),  in  which  a  good  deal 
of  information  will  be  found  as  to  the  evolution  of  the  philo- 
sophical thought  of  Italy  on  this  and  kindred  problems. 

Two  Italian  works  issued  in  1882  need  only  be  men- 
tioned. The  first  is  Sul  Bello,  by  Sac.  Salvatore  di  Pietro, 
published  at  Palermo.  It  treats  (i)  of  natural  Beauty, 
(2)  of  moral  Beauty,  and  (3)  of  artificial  Beauty.  The 
second  is  a  note  Sul  Bello,  by  G.  S.  Ferrari,  published  at 
Verona  and  also  at  Padua. 


CHAPTER    XI 

THE   PHILOSOPHY   OF    HOLLAND 

FRANZ  HEMSTERHUIS  (1720-1790),  the  earliest  Dutch 
philosopher  who  discussed  the  subject  of  the  Beautiful, 
was,  to  a  certain  extent,  a  follower  of  Baumgarten.  The 
aim  of  his  whole  philosophy  was  to  mediate  between  the 
intellectual  and  the  emotive  in  Human  Nature,  and  to 
reconcile  them  ;  and  his  "  internal  sense "  was  the  recon- 
ciler. He  held  that  through  the  aesthetic  sense  we  attain 
to  a  real  knowledge  of  things,  but  that,  in  comparison  with 
the  clear  knowledge  which  science  yields,  it  is  dim  and 
confused  information  (verworrene  Vorstellungen).  The 
mind  desires  the  fullest  possible  knowledge  of  all  things, 
but  it  is  fettered  by  sense,  and  by  the  interrupted  action  of 
the  several  senses.  As  all  its  knowledge  comes  primarily 
through  sense,  the  mind  tries  to  overcome  the  barrier,  and 
to  reach  the  largest  number  of  ideas  open  to  it  in  the; 
shortest  possible  time.  This  it  reaches  most  of  all  by  means 
of  Beauty,  which  may  therefore  be  denned  as  "  that  element 
in  an  object  which  affords  the  largest  number  of  ideas  in 
the  shortest  time."  But  the  senses  can  act  simultaneously, 
and  it  certainly  is  not  necessary  to  the  idea  of  Beauty  that, 
many  separate  ideas  should  coalesce.  Their  union  mayi 
enhance  the  beauty  of  an  object,  but  it  does  not  create  it. 
A  single  idea  may  give  rise  to  the  feeling  of  Beauty,  and  con- 
stitute it ;  while  rapidity  of  perception  has  really  nothing  to 
do  with  it.  To  affirm  that  the  more  numerous  the  elements 
in  a  beautiful  object  are,  the  greater  is  its  beauty,  is  manifestly 
not  to  solve  the  problem  of  the  nature  of  Beauty  in  itself. 


i54  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

In  1778,  Hieronymus  van  Alphen  (1746-1803)  freely 
translated  from  the  German  of  F.  J.  Riedel,  and  issued  in 
two  volumes,  with  additions,  notes,  and  an  introduction  for 
the  use  of  Dutch  readers,  a  Theorie  vari  Schoone  Kunsten 
en  Wetenschappen.  He  was  a  statesman  and  a  poet,  and 
!  published  several  volumes  of  verse.  Van  Alphen  classified 
'human  desires  as  follows — (i)  those  that  strive  after  the 
possession  of  an  object;  (2)  those  that  are  satisfied  with 
the  pleasure  occasioned  by  the  perception  or  sight  of  an 
object.  The  former  strive  after  Goodness,  the  latter  after 
the  Beautiful.  Therefore  we  call  all  that  can  please  our 
senses  (inward  and  outward),  our  imagination  and  passions, 
without  any  prospect  of  self-interest,  even  if  we  do  not 
possess  it,  beautiful.  We  call  that  ugly  which  displeases, 
\  even  though  there  be  no  likelihood  of  its  coming  into  our 
possession.  He  affirmed  (i)  that  Beauty  is  no  natural  and 
inseparable  quality  of  the  things  which  we  call  beautiful ; 

(2)  that  Beauty  is  not  inherent  in  the  objects  themselves, 
like  Perfection,  without  regard  to  a  percipient  being ;  and 

(3)  that  Beauty  is  of  a  relative  nature,  and  the  relation  in 
which  it  stands  to  us  is  that  it  pleases  us. 

The  object  which  is  to  please,  must  be  sensuous  ;  it 
must  not  show,  in  relation  to  the  whole,  any  obvious  im- 
perfection. It  must  also  occupy  us  sufficiently,  and  cause 
our  attention  to  be  concentrated  upon  it ;  while  it  must  not 
]be  represented  too  plainly  and  in  detail.  Beauty  is  sensuous 
/  unity  in  sensuous  variety. 

The  impressions  of  the  lower  senses,  Taste,  Smell,  etc., 
;are  only  pleasant  ;  but  through  Sight  and  Hearing,  in  their 
simplest  forms  (colour  and  tone),  the  elements  of  beauty  are 
brought  in,  and  are  pronounced  beautiful.  The  former 
lack  beauty,  because  they  are  destitute  both  of  perfect 
measure  and  of  precision,  which,  together  with  a  pleasant 
impression  of  the  senses,  produce  beauty.  Side  by  side 
with  the  beauty  of  which  the  elements  are  Colour  and 
Tone,  we  have  the  beauty  of  Form  and  Motion. 

We  must  distinguish,  however,  between  real  Beauty  in 
Nature,  and  our  ideal  of  the  highest  possible  Beauty. 
Nature  not  only  produces  Beauty,  it  also  yields  Perfection  ; 


xi  The  Philosophy  of  Holland  155 

and  these  two  are  often  opposed  to  each  other.  When- 
they  are  so,  Beauty  must  give  way  to  Perfection.  It  is  for 
this  reason  that  the  beauties  of  Nature  do  not  reach  the 
ideal,  of  which  they  are,  nevertheless,  the  foundation  ;  and 
for  this  reason,  too,  they  are  often  surpassed  by  the  pro- 
ductions of  Art.  Our  artists  take  Beauty  as  their  sole  aim, 
and  when  they  follow  Nature  they  are  able  to  give  us 
beauty ;  but  when  Nature  (at  the  cost  of  beauty)  gives  us 
Perfection,  the  Fine  Arts  must  produce  works  which  surpass 
the  beauties  of  Nature,  and  approach  the  ideal  of  the  highest 
possible  beauty. 

Immediately  after  the  publication  of  this  book,  W.  E.  de 
Perponcher  wrote  some  letters  to  Van  Alphen  in  criticism 
of  his  theory  of  Beauty,  and  to  these  Van  Alphen  replied. 
It  was  the  Aristotelian  and  Platonist  controversy  renewed 
on  a  small  scale.  Perponcher  was  a  follower  of  Charles 
Batteux  (see  p.  101),  who  held  that  all  good  art  is  mimetic. 
He  affirmed  that  the  copying  or  free  imitation  of  the  beauties 
of  Nature  lay  at  the  root  of  all  the  Fine  Arts. 

In  reply,  Van  Alphen  maintained  that  this  cannot  be 
taken  as  our  general  and  first  principle,  because  we  cannot 
deduce  from  it  the  rules  and  precepts  for  all  artists  in 
every  branch  of  Art.  He  thought  Batteux  right  in  many 
of  his  views  ;  but  he  was  also  of  opinion  that  the  beauties 
of  Nature  (la  belle  nature)  were  too  vague,  too  indistinct 
to  be  a  foundation  for  aesthetic  reasoning.  Even  when  this 
idea  is  taken  in  the  sense  generally  given  to  it,  and  stretched 
to  the  utmost,  it  is  still  too  limited  for  Poetry. 

De  Perponcher  maintained  that  in  taking  Batteux's 
generalisation  as  the  first  principle  of  Art,  we  do  not 
exclude  all  original  invention  or  original  feeling.  Even 
the  poet,  who  gives  us  his  own  thoughts  and  feelings,  is 
following  or  copying  Nature,  since  he  must  continually 
compare  his  own  thoughts  and  feelings  with  those  of 
other  men.  All  Art-products  have  their  root  in  a  close 
study  of  Nature,  and  nothing  has  been  produced  which 
may  not  be  found  there.  Van  Alphen,  on  the  contrary,  is 
of  opinion  that  when  a  poet  expresses  his  own  emotions 
in  verse,  there  is  no  copying  or  following  of  Nature,  but 


156  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

Nature  itself  is  at  work.  De  Perponcher  objects  to  the 
theory  that  an  artist  must  search  for  beauty  without  regard 
to  Perfection.  In  that  case,  he  argues,  a  wrong  and  per- 
nicious taste  will  develop  itself  without  check.  Van  Alphen 
answers  that  this  is  true,  but  says  that  we  cannot  blame 
the  artist  for  it,  although  as  a  citizen  it  may  not  be  always 
desirable  for  him  to  make  use  of  the  freedom  which  he 
undoubtedly  possesses  as  an  artist. 

The  work  of  an  anonymous  writer  in  1788,  De  Geest  der 
Nederlandsche  dichters  met  Verhandeling  over  het  Bevallige 
het  naive  en  de  romancen  (The  Spirit  of  the  Dutch  poets, 
with  a  Treatise  about  the  Graceful,  the  Naive,  and  the 
Romantic),  is  of  slight  value.  More  important  is  the 
following,  written  in  1802  by  J.  F.  van  Beeck  Calkoen 
(1772-1811),  Professor  of  Philosophy  in  Leiden  1800-1805, 
and  in  Utrecht  1805-1811,  Euryalus  over  het  Schoone. 
His  conclusions  on  the  subject  of  the  Beautiful  are  as 
follows  : — (i)  What  is  perceived  by  the  senses  is  beautiful, 
if  its  parts  are  arranged  and  combined  after  an  intellectual 
order  or  law.  (2)  When  we  feel  that  anything  is  beautiful, 
that  feeling  is  awakened  by  our  discernment  of  the  relation 
between  the  intellectual  and  the  material.  Intellectual 
unity  is  always  the  foundation  of  the  beautiful.  From  this 
he  infers,  among  other  things,  that  in  Architecture,  Sculpture, 
and  Painting,  Beauty  lies  in  a  mathematical  order,  by  which 
the  relation  and  position  of  lines  and  planes  are  fixed.  The 
artist  perceives  this  equation  of  lines  and  planes  at  once  by 
sight,  feeling,  and  inspiration  through  a  mathematical  tact. 

In  1827,  Humbert  de  Superville  wrote  at  Leiden  an 
essay  on  Les  Signes  Inconditionnels  de  VArt.  Though  the 
work  is  written  in  French,  the  author,  a  Dutchman,  was 
Director  of  the  Museum  of  Plaster  Casts  in  Leiden.  It  is  a 
somewhat  remarkable  book  ;  and  in  it  he  demonstrates  that 
lines,  placed  in  a  certain  direction  on  both  sides  of  an  axis, 
give  the  same  definite  assthetical  impression  to  every  one, 
!  quite  apart  from  their  mathematical  character.  Taking 
the  human  face  as  the  basis  of  his  demonstration,  he  shows 
that  the  lines  of  the  different  organs  may  have  three  distinct 
positions  with  respect  to  the  axis — one  converging,  the 


xi  The  Philosophy  of  Holland  157 

second  horizontal,  and  the  third  expanding.  The  first  will  I 
always  give  the  impression  of  a  weeping,  the  second  of  an 
unexpressive,  and  the  third  of  a  laughing  face.  These  three 
directions  of  the  lines  of  the  face  are  seen  in  the  three 
typical  heads  of  Venus,  Pallas,  and  Juno,  indicating  respect- 
ively voluptuousness,  wisdom,  and  egoism.  We  may  deduce 
from  these  three  schemata  of  lines,  which  respectively 
indicate  (i)  passion,  agitation,  inconstancy;  (2)  order, 
equilibrium,  dignity,  durability ;  (3)  reflection,  depth  of 
thought,  solemnity,  sublimity.  To  these  lines  correspond 
the  colours  red  (seen  in  blood  and  fire,  and  symbolic  of 
movement),  white  (symbolic  of  peace),  and  black  (symbolic 
of  silence,  sorrow,  death),  making  part  of  the  same  "signes 
inconditionnels." 

He  thinks  that  these  principles  hold  good  in  the  animal 
and  vegetable  kingdoms  as  well,  and  are  borne  witness  to 
in  the  Aesthetic  impressions  of  beauty  we  receive  from  the 
forms  and  outlines  both  of  animals  and  trees.  In  Art 
these  same  lines  produce  impressions  everywhere  analogous 
to  the  lines  of  the  three  types  of  face  already  referred  to. 
Thus  a  Doric  temple,  with  its  horizontal  lines,  has  for  us  a 
totally  different  character  from  a  Gothic  cathedral,  with  its 
pointed  lines.  The  first  is  an  image  of  equilibrium,  and 
calmness,  or  greatness  of  soul ;  the  second  is  the  symbol  of 
the  religious  spirit,  casting  its  looks  and  thoughts  upwards. 
The  Gothic  and  the  Grecian  architectural  lines  show  us  two 
of  the  "  signes  inconditionnels."  In  the  Chinese  buildings, 
with  their  upturned  curves,  we  find  the  third,  showing  the 
absence  alike  of  dignity,  stability,  and  rest. 

De  Socratische  School,  by  Ph.  W.  van  Hensde,  Professor 
of  Philosophy  at  Utrecht,  was  published  in  1834.  He 
takes  the  theory  of  Plato  as  his  basis,  and  says  that  the 
Socratic  method  of  philosophical  study  is  the  one  which 
should  be  adopted  and  followed  in  the  nineteenth  century. 
He  comes  to  the  following  conclusions : — The  love  of 
Beauty  springs  in  reality  from  want.  If  man  found  entire 
satisfaction  in  himself,  he  would  not  strive  after  Beauty,  or 
even  Goodness.  Feeling  the  need  of  Beauty,  and  loving- 
it  ardently,  he  tries  to  create  things  as  like  his  ideal  of 


158  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

'  it  as  possible.  The  love  of  the  Beautiful  is  the  origin  of 
the  Arts,  as  the  love  of  Truth  is  the  origin  of  Science.  This 
love  gives  scope  to  all  the  faculties  of  the  mind,  which  in 
their  turn  give  birth  to  the  sciences.  The  Arts  and  their 
productions  come  from  the  same  root,  viz.  a  sense  of 
harmony  and  measure,  of  taste  and  imagination.  The  end 
'  of  Art  with  the  Greeks  was  the  stimulus  of  the  religious 
sense  ;  their  study  and  culture  were  designed  for  the  moral 
and  religious  education  of  man.  So  it  ought  to  be  with 
us.  The  Arts  should  not  be  cultivated  solely  for  use  or 
pleasure.  Their  highest  aim  is  to  produce  the  highest 
moral  beauty,  which  is  the  only  true  beauty.  The  Beauti- 
ful exists  in  all  ideals,  and  it  is  this  that  charms  us  most  in 
the  masterpieces  of  art.  The  highest,  or  moral  beauty, 
however,  does  not  exist  in  all  ideals,  although  certainly 
all  artists  should  look  to  it  as  their  highest  aim.  Nothing 
is  beautiful  that  is  not  true  ;  and  as  truth  is  the  aim  of 
science,  we  here  find  the  relation  which  makes  of  Art  and 
Science  one  great  harmonious  whole. 

Professor  C.  W.  Opzoomer,  the  successor  of  P.  W.  van 
Hensde  in  the  Chair  of  Philosophy  at  Utrecht,  is  the  author 
of  Het  Wezen  der  Kennis.  Opzoomer  gives  a  somewhat 
elaborate  classification  of  knowledge,  the  first  section  of 
which  he  calls  Psychical  Anthropology  or  Psychology,  and 
he  subdivides  it  thus — (i)  Logic;  (2)  ^Esthetics,  taken  in 
its  most  general  sense  as  the  knowledge  of  man  as  a  sentient 
being,  of  which  the  doctrine  of  the  Beautiful  is  a  part ;  (3) 
Ethology.  It  would  be  impossible  for  us  to  estimate  Beauty 
or  to  enjoy  Art  if  we  had  no  inborn  sense  or  feeling  of 
Beauty.  The  objects  which  we  observe  by  our  senses, 
the  operations  of  which  we  learn  to  know,  we  do  not 
judge  merely  from  the  view-point  of  sensuous  feeling,  but 
also  from  that  of  our  feeling  of  Beauty.  We  do  not  merely 
ask  whether  the  objects  are  agreeable  and  useful  to  us,  we 
also  ask  whether  they,  are  beautiful.  It  is  not  unusual  that 
what  our  sensuous  nature  considers  desirable,  and  even 
necessary,  awakens  at  the  same  time  our  aversion,  as  being 
ugly ;  whereas  what  affects  us  painfully  and  what  we 
strenuously  oppose,  often  claims  our  admiration.  If  we 


xi  The  Philosophy  of  Holland  159 

had  no  innate  feeling  of  beauty,  we  would  never  be 
able  to  understand  its  definitions  as  given  by  others,  and 
the  nature  of  Beauty  would  remain  for  ever  hidden  from  us. 
But  having  this  feeling,  and  being  led  by  it  to  reject  some 
things  as  ugly,  and  to  praise  others  as  beautiful,  it  is  possible 
for  us  to  discover  by  strict  analysis  the  characteristics  which 
give  beauty  to  objects.  If  we  doubt  our  own  judgment,  the 
verdict  of  the  Ages  will  serve  us  as  a  touchstone. 

By  continued  analysis  and  comparison  we  find  the 
nature  of  the  Beautiful.  It  is  not  symmetry,  but  rather  the ' 
harmony  of  the  whole  of  an  object  with  its  different  parts, 
so  that  all  the  parts  help  to  produce  the  impression  which 
results.  There  must  also  be  harmony  between  the  form  of 
a  work  of  Beauty  and  the  thought  to  which  it  gives  ex-  : 
pression.  But  harmony  alone  is  not  enough.  A  beautiful 
form  is  much,  but  its  contents,  the  thoughts  within  it,  must ' 
not  be  neglected  ;  and  the  artist  and  his  work  will  take  a 
higher  place  according  to  the  height  to  which  the  artist's 
mind  has  reached.  His  ideas,  however,  must  be  artistic, 
that  is  to  say,  they  must  be  ideas  fit  to  bear  the  sensuous 
forms  of  Art.  This  is  true  even  of  the  most  spiritual  of  arts, 
viz.  Poetry.  Not  all  thoughts  or  ideas  are  artistic.  The  aim 
of  the  artist  is  to  create  Beauty.  It  has  been  said  that  his 
aim  must  be  to  follow,  and  to  copy  Nature  ;  but  by  so  doing 
the  Ideal,  which  is  the  inmost  soul  of  Art,  vanishes.  It  is 
untrue  that  Art  must  be  made  subservient  to  morality  or 
religion.  Art  and  Beauty  are  sure  to  help  Virtue,  but  only 
as  her  free  allies,  not  as  her  slaves.  Our  innate  sense  of 
Beauty  may  be  considered  as  the  connecting  link  between 
the  imperfect  world  and  the  perfect,  because  it  shows  us 
divine  beauty  in  actual  things,  and  teaches  us  to  form 
ideals,  and  artistic  creations,  which  not  only  copy  Nature 
but  surpass  it. 

Populaire  Aesthetische  Beschouwingen  over  de  Symmetric 
of  de  Bevallige  Proportien  (Popular  ^sthetical  Remarks 
about  Symmetry  or  the  Graceful  Proportions),  by  H.  G. 
A.  L.  Fock  (1875).  The  author  thinks  that  in  its  original] 
sense,  as  used  by  the  Greeks,  Symmetry  indicated  not  our  ' 
modern  idea  of  it,  but  a  graceful,  pleasing  proportion  of) 


160  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

Fthe  different  parts  of  an  object ;  this  pleasing  effect  being 
only  obtained  when  the  proportion  could  be  expressed  by 
small  numbers.  Thus,  if  a  line  of  130  possible  sections 
be  divided  into  parts  of  30,  40,  and  60,  it  is  divided 
symmetrically  ;  its  proportions  being  expressed  in  the 
numbers  3,  4,  and  6.  If  the  same  supposed  line  were 
divided  into  parts  of  22,  79,  and  29  respectively,  there 
would  be  no  symmetry,  because  the  proportion  can  only  be 
given  in  the  larger  numbers.  He  is  of  opinion  that  the 
lost  theory  of  Polycleitus,  which  he  explained  by  a  model 
figure,  and  by  which  he  taught  what  the  respective  lengths 
of  the  different  parts  of  the  human  body  must  be  in  order 
to  give  a  graceful  well-formed  whole,  was  based  upon  this 
symmetry  of  proportion.  He  then  proceeds  to  explain 
how  this  same  symmetry  is  found  in  the  dimensions  of  the 
Pyramids,  the  Greek  Temples,  the  Gothic  Cathedrals,  in 
ceramic  objects,  gold  and  silver  work,  etc.,  in  short,  in 
all  true  works  of  art,  in  endless  variety  ;  also  in  the  con- 
struction of  the  human  body,  and  that  of  different  animals. 
He  believes  this  Symmetry,  in  its  new  meaning,  to  be  a 
condemnation  of  Zeising's  aurea  sectio  (see  p.  68). 

The  most  elaborate  work  of  recent  years  in  Dutch 
Esthetics  is  the  Nederlandsche  Aesthetik,  by  J.  van  Vloten 
(1881),  the  editor  of  Spinoza's  works.  His  work  begins 
with  a  general  analysis  of  the  human  faculties,  from  sensa- 
tion to  thought  and  will.  In  reference  to  Beauty  he  says 
all  beauty  is  life  in  a  harmonious  form,  life  showing  itself 
in  time  and  space.  Therefore  all  art  must  be  true  to  life. 
Everything  that  buys  its  originality  at  the  expense  of  truth 
— that  is  to  say,  universal  human  truth,  as  well  as  truth 
to  Nature — is  unnatural,  and  repugnant  to  our  taste.  The 
principal  rules  to  which  all  works  of  art  must  conform 
s  (  are  method,  unity  in  diversity,  symmetry,  and  proportion. 

i  Diversity  and  motion  must  be  there,  if  our  eye  would  not 

]  be  fatigued  by  too  much  sameness  ;  but  this  diversity  must 
be  controlled  by  order,  which  combines  differences  in  one 
harmonious  whole.  Symmetry  is  another  very  important 
rule.  An  object  is  symmetrical  when  the  parts  on  each 

,  side  of  the  diameter  are   equal,  which,  however,  does  not 


xi  The  Philosophy  of  Holland  161 

hinder  the  greatest  variety  of  form.  Symmetry  is  obvious } 
at  once  to  the  eye  ;  proportion,  though  based  upon  the  same 
desire  for  unity  and  measure,  has  a  more  hidden  influence, 
and  shows  itself  only  in  its  general  effect.  Adolf  Zeising's 
well-known  aurea  sectio  is  the  law  that  lies  at  the  root  of 
the  study  of  Proportion.  This  law  is  not  only  applicable  to 
the  human  body,  but  also  to  the  mineral,  vegetable,  and 
animal  kingdoms.  Both  balance  and  counterbalance  must 
be  found  in  the  productions  of  art.  Of  no  less  importance 
than  this  harmony  between  the  whole  and  its  parts  is  the 
harmony  between  the  thought,  which  the  artist  wants  to 
express,  and  the  form  with  which  it  is  clothed — that  between 
the  soul  of  the  work  and  its  image.  Beauty  can  only  be 
attained  by  avoiding  conflict. 

The  Universe  is  beautiful  because  it  is  the  perfect  image 
of  eternally  renewed  life  ;  it  is  a  harmonious  whole,  full  of 
and  inspired  by  the  highest  spirit  of  life.  Thoroughly  to 
understand  and  appreciate  its  beauty,  we  must  exercise  our 
faculties  in  the  contemplation  of  its  separate  parts.  Our 
admiration  continually  increases  when  we  discover  how 
the  simplest  germ  is  gradually  developed  into  the  most 
complicated  structure.  The  charm  of  a  landscape,  taken 
as  a  whole,  lies  in  the  impression  which  we  receive  from 
the  happy  combination  and  harmonious  relation  of  the 
natural  objects,  organic  and  inorganic,  of  which  it  is  com- 
posed. It  is  a  powerful  help  in  aesthetic  education  to 
excite  and  develop  an  appreciation  of  the  different  aspects 
which  Nature  assumes  in  different  countries. 

Van  Vloten  next  discusses  the  phenomena  of  Motion, 
Sound,  and  Light,  which  have  had  most  to  do  with  our 
recognition  of  the  Beautiful,  the  nature  of  Art  as  not 
merely  imitative,  the  relation  of  Esthetics  to  Ethics ;  and 
then  proceeds  to  a  consideration  of  the  six  separate  Arts  in 
detail,  the  classification  of  which,  he  says,  dates  from  the 
Middle  Ages.  His  analytic  power  is  seen  at  its  best  in 
these  concluding  sections  of  his  book. 

In  1889,  J.  P.-  N.  Land,  Professor  of  Philosophy  in  the 
University  of  Leiden,  published  an  Inleiding  tot  de  Wijsbe- 
geerte  (An  Introduction  to  Philosophy).  In  it  he  discusses 

M 


1 62  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

the  subject  of  Beauty  and  Art.  In  trying  to  give  a  defini- 
tion of  the  Beautiful  from  which  the  definition  of  Art  must 
be  deduced,  we  have  first  to  ask  whether  Beauty  is  a  thing 
sharply  defined  (like  a  circle  or  a  straight  line),  or  whether 
it  indicates  many  qualities  of  objects,  more  or  less  related, 
which  perhaps  have  nothing  in  common,  but  only  this,  that 
they  procure  for  man  (in  many  different  ways)  an  unselfish 
enjoyment. 

It  is  extremely  difficult  to  give  a  general  answer  to  the 
question,  What  is  beautiful,  either  in  Art  or  in  Nature  ?  To 
give  a  normal  judgment,  one  ought  to  study  man  in  his 
development  throughout  the  ages,  and  try  to  find  out  what 
has  been  considered  the  most  beautiful  for  a  long  time,  and 
in  a  large  circle. 

If  Beauty  be  one  separate  quality,  e.g.  harmony,  it  is 
nevertheless  united  and  interwoven  with  so  many  other 
pleasing  qualities,  that  to  treat  of  it  separately  makes  it  not 
much  more  than  a  lifeless  mathematical  conception.  If  one 
intends  to  study  all  pleasing  qualities  in  their  mutual 
relationships,  one  has  a  science  which  can  never  get  on 
without  the  help  of  experience,  and  for  which  systematic 
unity  is  only  an  ideal. 

Much  has  been  said  on  the  question,  Whether  the  Form 
of  a  work  of  Art  constitutes  its  beauty,  or  the  Thought  which 
it  is  meant  to  express  ?  If  Harmony  in  representation  be 
the  principal  aim  of  the  artist,  Beauty  may  undoubtedly 
be  achieved  by  well -chosen  colours  and  lines,  by  light, 
shadow,  etc.,  although  the  object  represented  be  perhaps 
of  little  interest.  But  a  work  of  Art,  in  which  harmony  of 
form  is  associated  with  an  object  which  awakens  our 
interest,  and  stimulates  our  attention,  will  fascinate  us  more 
lastingly.  True  and  high  art  must  be  distinguished  from 
its  lower  forms,  which  may  sometimes  please  us,  in  the 
inequalities  of  our  intellectual  life,  and  which  (as  such)  may 
perhaps  be  temporarily  beneficial. 

Apart  from  the  philosophical  questions  which  arise 
everywhere  in  the  study  of  Art,  and  its  many  forms,  we 
must  consider  what  its  cultivation  adds  to  the  harmonious 
development  of  man  ;  also  what  limits  must  be  observed,  if 


xi  The  Philosophy  of  Holland  163 

we  would  not  injure  other  important  interests.  It  cannot 
be  denied  that  the  cultivation  of  Art — or  the  manners  and 
ways  of  Life,  which  attend  it — often  promotes  a  super- 
excitation  of  the  passions,  and  a  slackening  of  the  sense  of 
duty,  and  personal  dignity.  For  this  reason  Art  has 
sometimes  drawn  upon  itself  wholesale  condemnation.  If  it 
be  said  that  every  one  who  is  unwilling  to  concede  unlimited 
freedom  to  Art  and  Artists,  is  a  narrow-minded  moralist, 
this  will  not  solve  the  problem  for  us  ;  especially  when  the 
question  may  be  put  whether  the  cultivation  of  Art  is 
sufficient  to  satisfy  our  desire  for  the  Beautiful.  Should  it 
not  be  our  highest  aim  to  get  to  the  primal  or  original  beauty, 
if  only  because  we  can  meet  with  it  oftener  than  we  can  see 
works  of  Art,  which  only  give  us,  from  time  to  time,  an 
ennobled  edition  of  a  fragment,  or  an  extract  of  the  world 
as  we  see  it  ?  Ought  we  not,  for  example,  to  consider 
more  the  beauty  of  our  speech,  than  that  of  music  ?  the 
beauty  of  the  life  we  lead,  more  than  that  of  an  epic  poem 
or  a  drama  ?  and  the  beauty  of  living  men  (beautiful  in  soul 
and  body)  above  that  of  statues  ?  Othenvise,  may  not  our 
worship  of  the  idea  deteriorate  into  an  adoration  of  the 
imperfect  and  the  perishable,  excellent  though  they  be  ? 
This  was  a  question  which  Plato  asked  himself,  and  man 
will  have  to  return  to  it  many  times. 


CHAPTER   XII 

THE    PHILOSOPHY    OF    BRITAIN 

I.  Bacon  to  Hutcheson 

THE  first  writer  on  the  subject  of  Beauty  in  our  English 
literature  is  not,  as  we  might  have  expected,  the  father  of 
British  philosophy,  Lord  Bacon.  His  remarks  on  Beauty  in 
the  De  Augmentis  are  very  fragmentary,  and  have  no  philo- 
sophical importance.  Perhaps  the  most  notable  saying  of 
Bacon's  on  the  subject  is  this  (in  his  forty-third  Essay)  : — 
"  That  is  the  best  part  of  Beauty,  which  a  picture  cannot 
express  ;  no,  nor  the  first  sight  of  the  eye.  There  is  no 
excellent  beauty  that  hath  not  some  strangeness  in  the 
proportion." 

A  translation  of  Dufresnoy's  poem,  De  Arte  Graphica, 
by  Dryden,  appeared  in  1695,  with  a  preface  containing, 
with  other  things,  a  parallel  between  poetry  and  painting. 
Dryden  tries  to  unfold  the  characteristic  features  in  which 
all  good  Painting  and  Poetry  excels,  viz.  Invention,  Design, 
and  colouring  or  expression.  He  falls  back,  however,  on 
the  Aristotelian  imitation  of  Nature.  "  To  imitate  Nature 
well  is  the  perfection  of  Art."  "  That  picture  and  that  poem 
which  comes  nearest  the  resemblance  of  Nature  is  the  best ; 
but  it  follows  not  that  what  pleases  most  in  either  kind  is 
therefore  good,  but  what  ought  to  please." 

There  was,  however,  no  real  discussion  of  the  subject  ot 
the  Beautiful  amongst  English  writers  till  the  beginning  of 
the  eighteenth  century.  The  list  opens  with  the  name  of 
the  first  Lord  Shaftesbury,  the  author  of  the  Characteristics. 


CHAP,  xii          The  Philosophy  of  Britain  165 

He  was  the  first  philosopher  in  England  to  discuss  the 
question  of  the  Beautiful  with  any  insight,  or  with  an  ade- 
quate sense  of  its  importance.  His  Moralists,  a  Philosophical 
Rhapsody — originally  published  in  1 709,  and  afterwards  in- 
corporated in  the  Characteristics — with  all  its  diffuseness  and 
lack  of  precision,  has  passages  in  the  spirit  of  Plato.  As  a 
reproduction  of  the  Platonic  dialogue,  it  is  an  utter  failure  ; 
but  it  recalls  the  mental  attitude  and  the  general  drift  of 
the  teaching  of  the  Academy,  which  is  still  further  developed 
in  the  Miscellanies,  published  in  1714.  The  following 
extract  from  the  Rhapsody  will  show  how  far  Shaftesbury 
grasped  the  teaching  of  Plato  : — 

"  Whatever  in  Nature  is  beautiful  is  only  the  faint 
shadow  of  the  First  Beauty "  (pt.  iii.  sec.  2).  "  Beauty 
and  Good  are  one  and  the  same."  "  I  now  am  obliged  to 
go  far  in  the  pursuit  of  Beauty,  which  lies  very  absconded 
and  deep.  I  have  dwelt,  it  seems,  all  this  while  upon  the 
surface,  and  enjoyed  only  a  kind  of  slight  superficial 
beauties,  having  never  gone  in  search  of  Beauty  itself,  but 
of  what  I  fancied  such."  And  then  the  dialogue  proceeds 
(pt.  iii.  sec.  2) — "'Whatever  passions  you  may  have  for 
other  Beauties,  I  know,  good  Philocles,  you  are  no  such 
admirer  of  wealth  of  any  kind  as  to  allow  much  beauty  to 
it,  especially  in  a  rude  heap  or  mass.  But  in  medals, 
coins,  imbost  work,  statues,  etc.,  you  can  discover  beauty, 
and  admire  it.'  'True,'  said  I ;  '  but  not  for  the  metals'  sake.' 
'  'Tis  not  then  the  metal  or  matter  which  is  beautiful  with 
you?'  'No.'  'But  the  Art?'  'Certainly.'  '  The  Art  then 
is  the  Beauty.'  '  Right.'  '  And  the  Art  is  that  which 
beautifies.'  *  The  same.'  '  So  that  the  beautifying,  not 
the  beautified,  is  the  really  beautiful.'  '  It  seems  so.' 
'  For  that  which  is  beautified  is  beautiful  only  by  the 
accessories  of  something  beautifying,  and  by  the  recess  or 
withdrawing  of  the  same  it  ceases  to  be  beautiful  ?  '  '  Be  it 
so.'  '  In  respect  of  Bodies  then,  Beauty  comes  and  goes  ? ' 
'  So  we  see.'  '  Nor  is  the  body  itself  any  cause  of  its 
coming  or  staying.'  '  Never.'  '  So  there  is  no  principle  of 
Beauty  in  body.'  '  None  at  all.'  '  For  the  body  can  no 
way  be  the  cause  of  Beauty  to  itself?'  'No  way.'  'Nor 


1 66  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

govern,  nor  regulate  itself? '  '  Nor  yet  this.'  '  Nor  mean, 
nor  intend  itself  ?'  '  Not  this  neither.3  'Must  not  there- 
fore that  which  means  and  intends  for  it,  which  regulates 
and  orders  it,  be  the  principle  of  Beauty  in  it  ? '  'Of 
necessity.'  'And  what  must  that  be  ?'  ' Mind,  \  suppose; 
for  what  can  it  be  else  ?'  '  Here  then,'  said  he,  'is  all  I 
could  have  explained  to  you  before :  that  the  Beautiful, 
the  Fair,  the  Comely,  were  never  in  the  matter,  but  in  the 
art  and  design  ;  never  in  the  body  itself,  but  in  the  form, 
or  forming  Power.' " 

He  then  goes  on  to  "  establish  three  degrees  or  orders  of 
Beauty.  First,  the  dead  forms,  which  are  formed  by  nature 
and  by  man,  but  which  have  no  forming  power,  no  action 
or  intelligence  ;  secondly,  the  forms  which  form,  i.e.  which 
have  intelligence,  action,  and  operation."  Here  we  have 
double  beauty.  We  have  both  form,  the  effect  of  mind, 
and  the  mind  itself.  In  this  second  kind  or  type  we  have 
living  form,  vital  Beauty.  But  in  the  Beauty  which  fashions 
or  produces  Beauty  (artist-like)  we  rise  to  a  third  order. 
Architecture  and  music  resolve  themselves  into  this  last, 
which  is  the  order  of  the  parent  or  creative  Beauty.  So 
much  for  the  Philosophical  Rhapsody  of  1709. 

In  the  Miscellaneous  Reflections  of  1714,  Shaftesbury 
reverted  to  his  former  teaching  on  the  subject,  and  laid 
down  a  proposition,  in  which  the  three  provinces  of  the 
True,  the  Beautiful,  and  the  Good  are  mapped  out  almost 
as  clearly  as  by  Cousin.  "That  what  is  beautiful  is  har- 
monious and  proportionable,  what  is  harmonious  and  pro- 
portionable is  true,  and  what  is  at  once  both  beautiful  and 
true  is  of  consequence  agreeable  and  good."  In  a  note  he 
recurs  to  his  scale  of  Beauty  ;  the  first  in  the  inanimate,  the 
second  in  the  animate,  and  the  third  in  the  sphere  of  the 
mixed.  Inanimate  beauty  is  in  regular  figures,  symmetrical 
architecture,  harmonious  sounds  ;  the  animate  is  in  living 
things,  in  character,  in  societies,  communities,  and  common- 
wealths. In  the  third  the  two  forms  are  joined  (as  in  man, 
body  and  soul  are  united),  and  we  have  the  beauty  of  family 
life,  cemented  by  friendship,  and  of  national  life  with 
patriotic  feeling  as  the  tie. 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  167 

Shaftesbury  vindicates  the  originality  of  natural  beauty. 
He  speaks  of  it  as  existing  independently  "  in  figure,  colour, 
motion,  sound "  ;  and,  selecting  the  first,  he  asks  why  an 
infant  is  at  once  pleased  with  a  sphere  or  globe  in  preference 
to  irregular  shapes.  He  answers  that  there  is  "  a  natural 
beauty  which  the  eye  perceives  as  soon  as  the  object  is 
presented  to  it."  "  No  sooner  does  the  eye  open  to  see  a 
figure,  or  the  ear  to  hear  sounds,  than  straightway  Beauty 
results,  and  grace  and  harmony  are  acknowledged.  No 
sooner  are  actions  viewed,  and  affections  discerned,  than 
straight  our  inward  eye  distinguishes  the  fair,  the  shapely, 
the  admirable." 

In  his  ethical  teaching  Shaftesbury  threw  emphasis  on 
sentiment  rather  than  reason.  He  would  have  human  con- 
duct guided  by  natural  normal  impulse,  or  feeling,  rather 
than  by  the  control  of  a  law  from  without,  or  a  rational 
principle  from  within.  So  far  as  he  applied  his  doctrine  of 
Beauty,  which  he  had  derived,  both  directly  and  indirectly, 
from  the  Greeks — as  he  was  a  classical  scholar,  and  was  in 
sympathy  with  the  spirit  of  antiquity — to  the  sphere  of 
conduct,  an  action  was  to  be  condemned,  if  it  was  inhar- 
monious. A  selfish  act  was  an  ugly  one.  It  violated  the 
canons  of  good  taste,  whereas  an  action  that  was  normal, 
and  that  regarded  the  welfare  of  others  as  well  as  of  one- 
self, was  always  beautiful. 

From  2  ist  June  to  3d  July  1712,  Joseph  Addison 
discussed  the  "  Pleasures  of  the  Imagination,"  in  a  series  of 
ten  papers  in  the  Spectator  (Nos.  411  to  421).  Addison's 
essays  are  bright  and  sparkling,  but  his  philosophy  is 
both  slender  and  nebulous.  He  affirms  that  "  though  there  / 
is  not  perhaps  any  real  Beauty  or  Deformity  more  in  one  • 
piece  of  matter  than  in  another,  we  find  by  experience  that 
there  are  several  modifications  of  matter  "  [why  did  he  not 
say  *  objects  '  ?]  "  which  the  mind,  without  any  previous  con- 
sideration, pronounces  at  first  sight  beautiful  or  deformed." 
He  then  refers  to  a  second  kind  of  Beauty,  which  "  raises  in 
us  a  secret  delight  for  the  places  or  objects  in  which  we 
discover  it.  This  consists  either  in  the  gaiety  or  variety 
of  colours,  or  in  the  symmetry  and  proportion  of  parts,  in  the 


168  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautifttl         CHAP. 

'  arrangement  and  disposition  of  bodies,  or  in  a  just  mixture 
and  concurrence  of  all  together."  All  this  is  vague  enough. 
It  was  almost  inevitable,  however,  that  the  subject  should 
be  discussed  in  this  rhetorical  fashion  in  England  before  it 
was  handled  with  analytic  rigour  in  the  schools. 

The  English  empiricists,  as  a  rule,  true  to  the  funda- 
mental principle  of  their  system,  have  dealt  with  the  out- 
ward features  of  the  Beautiful,  and  tabulated  some  of  its 
characteristics  with  skill,  but  they  have  seldom  risen  above 
or  got  behind  these  external  features.  Many  of  them  have 
explicitly  avowed  that  we  cannot  reach  any  ultimate  principle. 
What  the  best  of  them  saw  was  a  sort  of  uniformity  in  the 
order  of  Nature,  but  not  a  unity  underlying  the  diversity  of 
its  forms. 

In  1725 — seventeen  years  after  Shaftesbury's  Moralists 
appeared — Francis  Hutcheson,  Professor  of  Philosophy  at 
Glasgow  University  (1694-1747),  published  a  book  which  he 
called  an  Enquiry  into  the  Original  of  our  ideas  of  Beauty 
and  Virtue,  This  book  was  professedly  an  explanation  and 
defence  of  the  teaching  of  Shaftesbury,  against  the  sub- 
sequent attack  of  Mandeville,  the  author  of  The  Fable  of 
the  Bees. 

In  his  preface  Hutcheson  says  that  his  chief  solicitude 
is  to  prove  "  that  there  is  some  sense  of  Beauty  natural  to 
man"  But  while  his  starting-point  is  thus  realistic  or 
matter  of  fact,  it  is  also  idealistic,  as  he  affirms  that  Beauty 
is  an  idea  in  us  ;  and  he  wants  to  find  out  what  occasions 
it,  what  quality  in  objects  excites  it.  He  concludes  that  it 
is  by  "  an  internal  sense "  that  we  perceive  Beauty,  or 
"  receive  its  impressions  "  ;  and  he  justifies  his  use  of  the 
term  "  sense,"  because  our  pleasure  does  not  arise  "  from 
any  knowledge  of  the  principles,  causes,  or  usefulness  of  the 
object."  We  recognise  a  Beauty  in  objects  before  we  are 
aware  of  any  advantage  to  be  derived  from  them. 

Hutcheson  divided  the  kinds  or  types  of  Beauty  into  the 
Absolute  and  the  Relative.  Absolute  Beauty,  however,  is 
not  beauty  in  an  object  out  of  all  relation  to  the  mind  that 
perceives  it ;  for,  without  mind  to  perceive  it,  no  object 
could  be  beautiful.  Absolute  Beauty  is  beauty  in  an  object 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  169 

without  relation  to  anything  beyond  it,  anything  of  which  it  is! 
an  imitation.  Relative  Beauty  is  beauty  in  objects  which  are 
resemblances  of  other  things.  The  ideas  of  absolute  beauty 
are  raised  in  us  by  the  perception  of  uniformity  amid' 
variety  ;  the  variety  increasing  the  beauty,  and  the  uni- 
formity heightening  it  also.  This  is  the  foundation  of  the 
beauty  we  perceive  in  Nature  generally ;  and  in  the  in- 
dividual things  in  Nature  that  we  call  beautiful  (especially 
in  living  things)  the  proportion  of  the  parts  to  one  another 
is  an  additional  source  of  their  beauty.  The  beauty  of 
theorems  is  due  to  the  amount  of  variety  mingling  with  - 
uniformity  in  them,  and  when  many  corollaries  are  deducible 
from  them.  The  same  is  true  of  beauty  in  the  great  laws 
of  Nature,  such  as  the  law  of  gravitation.  Then  as  to 
Relative  Beauty,  it  springs  from  the  imitation  of  what  is 
originally  beautiful.  To  this  the  beauty  of  metaphors, 
symbols,  and  allegories  is  due.  But  Hutcheson  affirms  that 
to  obtain  this  secondary  or  relative  beauty,  it  is  not  neces-' 
sary  that  there  should  be  any  beauty  in  the  original.  "An 
exact  imitation  shall  still  be  beautiful  though  the  original 
were  entirely  devoid  of  it." 

The  sixth  section  of  Hutcheson's  treatise  is  devoted  to 
the  "  originality  of  the  source  of  Beauty  among  men." 
Deformity  is  only  the  absence  of  beauty  where  it  was 
naturally  to  be  expected.  A  rude  heap  of  stones  is  not 
ugly ;  but  rude  and  irregular  architecture  is.  The  effect  of 
association  in  deflecting  our  judgments,  and  artificially 
changing  things  that  are  naturally  very  different,  is  fully  ad- 
mitted by  him  ;  and  he  thinks  that  it  is  due  to  the  influence 
of  association  that  many  persons  do  not  admire  what  is 
really  beautiful,  and  do  admire  what  is  not  beautiful.  Still, 
he  says,  "  there  is  a  natural  power  of  perception,  or  a  sense 
of  the  beauty  of  objects,  antecedent  to  all  custom,  education, 
or  example."  Custom  simply  makes  us  perceive  things, 
or  perform  actions,  more  easily  than  we  did  at  first ;  but, 
had  we  no  natural  sense  of  Beauty,  custom  could  never 
have  made  us  perceive  any  beauty  in  them.  In  other  words, 
it  enlarges  our  capacity,  and  quickens  our  powers,  but  it 
creates  nothing. 


170  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

The  net  result  of  Hutcheson's  speculations  on  the  Beauti- 
ful is  not  great.  All  honour  to  him,  however,  in  that 
prosaic  eighteenth  century,  for  the  work  which  he  did  as  a 
pioneer.  Probably  Pere  Andre  had  something  to  do  in 
suggesting  the  subject  to  Hutcheson  ;  and  it  is  worthy  of 
note  that,  with  the  exception  of  Andre,  British  writers 
preceded  those  of  Germany  and  France,  if  not  in  an  appre- 
ciation of  the  Beautiful,  at  least  in  recognising  the  fact  that 
the  subject  could  be  scientifically  dealt  with,  and  that  it 
demanded  philosophical  treatment.  The  Enquiry  into  the 
Original  of  our  ideas  of  Beauty  and  Virtue  is  the  prototype 
of  all  subsequent  discussions  in  Europe  on  the  True,  the 
Beautiful,  and  the  Good.  Kant  seems  to  have  read  the 
book  (it  was  translated  into  German)  ;  Jacobi  also  was 
familiar  with  it ;  and  Hutcheson  is  almost  the  only  English 
writer  on  the  subject  who  is  referred  to  by  the  German 
historians. 


2.  Berkeley  to  Hogarth 

In  the  third  dialogue  of  Alciphron,  or  the  Minute 
Philosopher,  written  by  George  Berkeley,  the  Bishop  of 
Cloyne  (1684-1753),  and  published  at  Dublin  in  1732, 
there  is  a  discussion  on  Moral  Beauty.  "  Doubtless,"  said 
Euphranor,  "there  is  a  Beauty  of  the  mind,  a  charm  in 
virtue,  a  symmetry  and  proportion  in  the  moral  world." 
This  moral  Beauty  was  known  to  the  ancients  by  the  name 
Honestum,  or  TO  KaXov.  Euphranor  gives  the  meaning  of 
it  as  he  understands  Plato  and  Aristotle,  and  then  asks 
Alciphron  for  his  definition  of  the  beauty  of  virtue,  since  he 
does  not  agree  with  Plato  and  Aristotle.  "  Moral  Beauty," 
he  replied,  "  is  of  so  familiar  and  abstracted  a  nature,  some- 
thing so  subtle,  fine,  and  fugacious,  that  it  will  not  bear 
being  handled  or  inspected,  like  every  gross  and  common 
object."  "  It  is  rather  to  be  felt  than  understood — a 
certain  je  ne  s$az  qtwi" — moral  beauty  being  perceived  by 
the  moral  sense,  as  colours  are  by  the  eye.  Euphranor 
rejoins  that  inward  feeling  is  a  very  uncertain  guide  in 
morals,  and  that  reason  should  rather  come  in,  and  balance 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  171 

pleasures  one  against  another.     Alciphron  replies  that  he 
contemns  the  man   who    "must  have   a  reason  for  being 
virtuous."     The  abstract  Beauty  of  virtue  should  itself  allure, 
and  virtue  be  "loved  for  virtue's   sake."     Euphranor  then 
asks  Alciphron  "  if  all  mankind  are  agreed  in  the  notion 
of  a  beauteous  face."     He  replies  that  "  all  minds  have  the 
ideas   of   order,    harmony,    and    proportion."       Euphranor 
presses  him,  however,  for  a  definition  of  Beauty  "in  the 
objects  of  sense."      Alciphron  replies,  "  Every  one  knows  ]  * 
that   Beauty  is  that  which  pleases "  ;    but,  as  odours  and 
tastes    are    not    beautiful,   but    pleasant   only,    it   must   be 
further  defined  as   consisting  "in   a   certain   symmetry  or 
proportion  pleasing  to  the  eye."     He  is  asked  if  it  is  the 
same  in  all  things.     He  replies  that  it  is  different  in  different ' 
things.      It  therefore  consists  in  proportions  and  relations, 
which  proportions  and  relations  must  be  so  adjusted  that 
the  whole  is  perfect  of  its  kind  ;  and  a  thing  is  perfect  in  P 
its  kind  when  it  answers  the  end  for  which  it  was  made.  | 
This  being  the  work  of  reason,  not  of  sense,  Beauty  "is  in / 
objects,  not  of  the  eye,  but  of  the   mind,"  and  Beauty  is  . 
discerned   only  by  the   mind.       Euphranor  then  refers  to  I 
architectural   proportion,   and  to    the   beauties  of  draping 
amongst  the  ancients,  which  he  compares  with  the  artificial 
ugliness    of  some    Gothic    dresses ;    and    concludes    that 
Beauty,  both  of  architecture  and  of  dress,   "depends   on 
their  subserving  to  certain  ends  and  uses."     This  gives  us 
the  distinction  between  the  Greek  and  the  Gothic  Archi- 
tecture— the  Greek  being  founded  on  reason,  necessity,  and 
use  ;  the  Gothic  being  fantastic.     Euphranor  further  pleads 
that  the  fact  that  a  thing  gave  pleasure  2000  years  ago, 
and  2000  miles  away,  and  that  it  does  so  now  and  here,  is 
proof  that  there  is  in  it  "  some  real  principle  of  Beauty,"    r 
and  that  we  may  therefore  conclude  that  the  order,  pro- 
portion, and  symmetry  of  objects,  which  tend  to  some  use 
or  end,  are  integral  elements  in  their  beauty.      The  dis- 
cussion   then    proceeds    to    moral    beauty,    and    Berkeley 
argues  that  the  beauty  of  the  moral  system  "  supposeth  a 
Providence." 

In   comparing  the   discussion   of  Beauty   in  Alciphron 


172  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

with  that  of  Shaftesbury  in  his  Rhapsody,  and  even  with 
that  of  Hutcheson  in  his  Enquiry,  it  will  be  seen  that  our 
English  idealism  has  assumed  a  new  and  a  more  finished 
form.  Its  affinity  with  the  teaching  of  Plato  is  more 
marked,  and  its  idealism  gives  character  to  the  style  no 
less  than  to  the  doctrine  of  Berkeley. 

In  1744  a  Treatise  concerning  Art,  and  another  on 
Music,  Painting,  and  Poetry,  were  written  by  James  Harris 
(1709-1780)  ;  better  known  as  the  author  of  Hermes  (1751) 
and  Philological  Arrangements  (1775).  It  ls  m  tne  f°rm 
of  a  dialogue,  and  a  very  cumbrous  dialogue  it  is.  Art  is 
defined  as  a  cause  set  in  operation  by  man  to  produce  an 
effect  which  he  only  can  produce  (not  a  very  luminous 
definition).  But  the  object  on  which  this  cause  operates 
in  not  the  abstract  course  of  Nature,  but  the  "transient, 
particular,  contingent "  Nature.  Art  is  "  an  energy " 
whose  dominion  is  of  the  widest  kind.  Fire,  air,  water, 
earth,  and  the  mind  of  man,  are  all  amenable  to  it ;  and  it 
always  operates  "for  the  sake  of  some  good,  relative  to 
human  life,  and  attainable  by  man  "  (p.  44). 

Towards  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century  Joseph 
Spence,  Professor  of  Poetry  in  the  University  of  Oxford, 
wrote  two  works  which  deal  with  the  subject  of  Beauty. 
The  first  was  Polymetis,  or  an  Enquiry  concerning  the 
Agreement  between  the  works  of  the  Roman  Poets,  and  the 
Remains  of  the  Ancient  Artists,  being  an  attempt  to  illus- 
trate them  -mutually  from  each  other  (1747).  This  work 
is  criticised  by  Lessing  in  his  Laocoon,  who  points  out  that 
Spence  did  not  distinguish  the  province  of  Art  with  accuracy, 
making  the  range  and  power  of  the  sculptor  equal  to  that  of 
the  poet.  One  of  the  special  aims  of  the  Laocoon  was  to 
distinguish  these  provinces.  He  held  that  all  repulsive 
subjects  must  be  removed  from  plastic  Art,  while  Poetry 
might  deal  with  them. 

Spence's  second  work  was  Crito ;  or  a  Dialogue  on 
Beauty,  printed  in  the  first  volume  of  Dodsley's  Fugitive 
Pieces  (London  1752),  and  afterwards  at  Dublin  in  1762. 
This  Dialogue  was  written  under  the  pseudonym  of  Sir 
Harry  Beaumont  "  I  should  as  soon  think,"  wrote  the 


xii  T/ie  Philosophy  of  Britain  173 

author,  "  of  dissecting  a  rainbow,  as  of  forming  grave  and 
punctual  notions  of  Beauty.  Who,  for  Heaven's  sake,  can 
reduce  to  rules  what  is  so  quick  and  so  variable  as  to  be 
shifting  its  appearance  every  moment  ?  "  (p.  9).  And  yet 
he  proceeds  to  lay  down  some  excellent,  if  not  "  grave  and 
punctual  notions."  "  Everything  belonging  to  Beauty  falls 
under  these  four  heads — Colour,  Form,  Expression,  Grace  ; 
the  two  former  of  which  are  the  body,  the  two  latter  the 
soul  of  Beauty"  (p.  n).  (i)  The  delight  of  Colour  is 
due  to  its  "natural  liveliness,"  the  charm,  when  colours 
"  are  properly  blended,"  of  the  idea  of  health  which  they 
convey,  and  of  variety,  when  many  different  kinds  of  colour 
are  intermixed.  (2)  In  Form  we  have  symmetry,  harmony, 
proportion.  But  (3)  in  Expression  the  ideas  and  changes 
of  the  mind  are  made  visible  by  look  and  gesture,  as  they 
also  are  (4)  by  Grace  ;  and  if  the  chief  seat  of  expression 
is  the  eye,  that  of  grace,  he  fancies,  is  the  mouth.  The 
discussion  is  not  a  profound  one  ;  but  the  dialogue  was 
adopted  almost  wholesale  in  an  article  on  Beauty  in  Wilkes' 
Encyclopedia  Londmensis,  and  also  in  Barrowes'  Modern 
Encyclopedia. 

The  principle  of  an  independent  standard  of  the  Beautiful, 
announced  by  Shaftesbury  and  Hutcheson,  had  leavened  a 
few  minds  in  Britain,  and  borne  fruit  in  various  ways  ;  and 
it  is  interesting  that  the  next  expression  of  opinion  on  the 
subject  came  from  one  of  the  artist -minds  of  England. 
William  Hogarth  is  better  known  as  a  painter  and  engraver, 
than  as  a  literary  man  or  a  philosopher.  Nevertheless  he 
published,  in  1753,  a  somewhat  important  book,  which  he 
called  The  Analysis  of  Beauty •,  "  written  "  (he  added  on  the 
title-page)  "with  a  view  of  fixing  the  fluctuating  ideas  of 
Taste."  Eight  years  before,  he  had  made  a  frontispiece  for 
one  of  his  engraved  works,  in  the  form  of  a  painter's  palette, 
on  which  he  drew  a  serpentine  line,  like  the  letter  S  ;  and 
under  it  he  placed  the  words,  "  the  Line  of  Beauty."  It  was 
a  sphinx- riddle  to  his  contemporaries.  The  Analysis  of 
1753,  however,  explained  it.  Like  the  work  of  1745,  it  had 
a  frontispiece ;  this  time  it  was  a  prismatic  cube,  within 
which  a  serpentine  line  was  drawn  from  the  apex  to  the  base, 


174  The  Philosophy  of  tlie  Beautiful          CHAP. 

with  the  word  "  Variety  "  printed  below.  In  his  preface, 
Hogarth  raises  the  question,  why  the  great  artists  of  the 
past  had  not  given  us  a  theory  of  the  Beautiful  ;  and  he 
answers  that  it  was  because  they  had  been  so  busy  with  their 
craft,  and  with  copying  Beauty,  that  they  had  found  no  time 
for  its  analysis,  so  that  "je  ne  s$ai  qiioi  had  become  a  fashion- 
able phrase  for  grace."  He  proceeds  to  defend  his  own 
Line  of  Beauty.  Rubens  had  made  use  of  a  large  flowing 
line,  Raphael  of  the  serpentine  line,  particularly  in  his 
draperies,  as  did  Peter  of  Cortona,  and  Correggio.  Albert 
Diirer  and  Vandyke  did  not ;  and  this  explains  why  there 
was  more  of  beauty  in  the  works  of  the  former  than  in  those 
of  the  latter. 

In  his  Introduction,  Hogarth  explains  that  his  aim  is  to 
show  what  the  principles  in  Nature  are,  by  which  we  call 
certain  objects  beautiful,  and  others  ugly.  These  principles 
are  "  fitness,  variety,  uniformity,  simplicity,  intricacy,  and 
quantity,  all  which  co-operate  in  the  production  of  Beauty, 
mutually  correcting,  and  occasionally  restraining  each  other." 
There  is  (i)  the  fitness  of  the  parts  to  the  design  for 

'  which  each  thing  is  formed,  as  in  the  case  of  the  eye  formed 
for  seeing.  There  is  (2)  variety  in  such  things  as  shape 
and  colour.  All  the  senses  rejoice  in  variety,  and  dislike 
uniformity.  But  the  variety  may  be  either  in  the  way  of 
increase  or  diminution,  and  the  results  in  either  case  be 

j  beautiful.  (3)  There  is  uniformity,  regularity,  and  sym- 
metry, which,  says  he,  "  please  only  as  they  seem  to  give 
the  idea  of  fitness."  (4)  Simplicity  and  distinctness. 
"  Simplicity  without  variety  is  wholly  insipid,"  but  with 
variety  it  pleases  the  eye  "  by  giving  it  the  power  of  enjoy- 
ing with  ease."  (5)  Intricacy.  The  eye  enjoys  "winding 
walks  and  serpentine  rivers,  and  all  sorts  of  objects  whose 
forms  are  composed  of  waving  and  serpentine  lines."  "  Intri- 
cacy of  form,"  he  says,  "  is  that  peculiarity  in  the  lines  that 
leads  the  eye  a  wanton  kind  of  chase  "  ;  and  he  adds  that 
"  grace  more  intimately  resides  in  this  than  in  the  other  five, 
except  '  variety,5  which  indeed  includes  this  and  all  the 
others."  (6)  Quantity.  Great  objects,  because  of  their 
greatness,  excite  our  admiration,  especially  if  simplicity  is 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  175 

allied  to  quantity.  "  It  is  quantity  that  adds  greatness  to 
grace."  These  six  principles  Hogarth  applies  to  Lines  and 
Figures,  to  Colours,  and  to  Actions.  In  every  kind  of' 
composition  he  affirms  that  the  art  of  composing  well  is  the 
art  of  varying  well  ;  and  he  says  that  St.  Paul's  Cathedral 
is  one  of  the  noblest  instances  of  the  application  of  every 
principle  he  has  mentioned.  In  this  monumental  work  of 
Wren  we  find  "  variety  without  confusion,  simplicity  with- 
out nakedness,  richness  without  tawdriness,  distinctness 
without  hardness,  and  quantity  without  excess." 

The  line  of  Beauty  or  Grace,  according  to  Hogarth,  is  '  ' 
the  serpentine  line,  its  excellence  being  due  to  its  curves 
giving  play  to  the  imagination,  as  well  as  delighting  the 
eye.  He  illustrates  this  at  great  length,  and^tries  to  show 
that  almost  all  ornamentation,  from  the  very  beginning  of 
Art,  consisted  in  the  double  curve.  But  his  analysis  of  the 
beauty  of  colour  is  perhaps  more  interesting.  Here  it  is 
variety — the  utmost  possible  variety — that  is  the  source  of 
the  charm.  It  is,  he  says,  "the  not  knowing  Nature's 
artful  and  intricate  method  of  uniting  colours  for  the  pro- 
duction of  the  finer  tint  of  flesh,  that  hath  made  colour- 
ing, in  the  art  of  painting,  a  mystery  in  all  ages."  He 
thinks  Correggio  stands  almost  alone  in  this  excellence, 
that  Guido  was  always  at  a  loss  about  it,  and  that  Poussin 
seems  scarcely  ever  to  have  had  a  glimpse  of  it. 


3.  Burke  to  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds 

In  1756,  three  years  after  Hogarth's  Analysis  appeared, 
Edmund  Burke  published  his  Essay  on  the  Sublime  and 
Beautiful.  Burke's  theory  harked  back  from  the  idealistic 
to  almost  the  lowest  empirical  level.  He  identified  the 
Beautiful  with  the  pleasant.  But  his  discussion  has  this 
interest  and  merit,  that  it  dealt  with  some  of  the  physiological 
aspects  of  the  question.  The  elements  of  Beauty,  accord- 
ing to  Burke,  are — (i)  smallness  of  size,  (2)  smoothness  of 
surface,  (3)  variety  of  outline  in  curves,  (4)  delicacy,  sug- 
gesting fragility,  (5)  brightness,  and  softness  of  colour.  He 


176  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

emphasised  smoothness  of  surface  and  softness  of  outline 
till  he  made  it  almost  all -dominant,  and  in  consequence 
gave  his  theory  a  one  -  sided  character.  Those  objects 
appear  beautiful  which  have  the  power  of  relaxing  our 
nerves,  and  producing  in  us  a  sort  of  languor  and  repose. 
He  could  see  no  beauty  in  angles,  or  sharp  points  of  any 
kind  ;  and  so,  in  his  eulogy  of  smoothness,  he  mistook  one 
of  the  conditions  of  beauty  for  its  constitutive  essence. 
Burke's  was  a  thoroughly  partisan  theory.  His  way  of 
comparing  the  Beautiful  with  the  Sublime  has  more  interest 
than  his  separate  discussion  of  either  of  them.  "  Sublime 
objects,"  he  says  (pt.  iii.  p.  27),  "  are  vast  in  their  dimensions 
— beautiful  ones  comparatively  small :  beauty  should  be 
smooth  and  polished  —  the  great  rugged  and  negligent : 
beauty  should  show  the  right  line,  yet  deviate  from  it 
insensibly — the  great  in  many  cases  loves  the  right  line, 
and  when  it  deviates  makes  a  strong  deviation  :  beauty 
should  not  be  obscure — the  great  ought  to  be  dark  and 
gloomy  :  beauty  should  be  light  and  delicate — the  great 
ought  to  be  solid,  and  even  massive." 

The  year  after  Burke's  essay  appeared  (in  1757),  David 
Hume  issued  his  Four  Dissertations,  the  last  of  which  was 
"  Of  the  Standard  of  Taste."  It  was  afterwards  included 
in  his  Essays  :  Moral,  Political,  and  Literary,  where  it  forms 
the  twenty-third  essay.  It  is,  in  many  respects,  remarkable ; 
mainly  because  in  it  the  chief  agnostic  of  the  eighteenth 
century  takes  up  a  position  which  is  out  of  keeping  with 
the  rest  of  his  philosophy,  and  which,  had  it  been  carried 
out  consistently,  would  have  led  to  a  vital  modification 
of  the  doctrine  of  experience,  if  not  so  far  as  the  opposite 
philosophy  of  idealism.  On  this  point  Hume  has  been 
greatly  misunderstood.  His  clear  and  penetrating  intellect 
is  seen  to  much  advantage  in  his  essay  on  Taste.  He 
begins  by  saying  that  it  is  natural  for  us  to  desire  a 
standard  of  Taste,  and  he  refers  to  "  a  species  of  Philosophy 
which  cuts  off  all  hope  of  success  in  such  an  attempt," — a 
philosophy  which  says — 

"  Beauty  is  no  quality  in  things  themselves.  It  exists 
merely  in  the  mind  which  contemplates  them,  and  each 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  177 

mind  perceives  a  different  beauty.  One  person  may  even 
perceive  deformity  where  another  is  sensible  of  beauty,  and 
every  individual  ought  to  acquiesce  in  his  own  sentiments, 
without  pretending  to  regulate  those  of  others.  To  seek 
the  real  Beauty  or  the  real  deformity  is  as  fruitless  an 
enquiry  as  to  pretend  to  ascertain  the  real  sweet  or  the  real 
bitter  "  ;  and  so  the  old  maxim  de  gustibus,  etc.,  should  be 
extended  to  "  mental  as  well  as  bodily  taste." 

Many  persons  have  supposed  that  in  this  paragraph  Hume 
was  quoting  his  own  opinion  ;  whereas  he  goes  on  imme- 
diately to  state — and  the  whole  purpose  of  his  essay  is  to 
defend — what  he  calls  "  a  species  of  common  sense,  which 
opposes  it,  or  at  least  seems  to  modify  and  restrain  it."  The 
very  burden  of  the  essay  is  a  vindication  of  the  general  and 
permanent  principles  of  criticism,  as  against  the  fluctuating 
verdicts  of  individual  minds.  He  recalls  to  us  the  fact 
that  "  the  same  Homer  who  pleased  at  Athens  and  Rome 
is  still  admired  at  Paris  and  London,"  and  he  connects  this 
with  what  he  calls  "  certain  qualities  in  the  original  struc- 
ture of  the  internal  fabric  [i.e.  the  mind  of  man]  which 
are  calculated  to  please,  and  others  to  displease."  This 
is  really  a  concession,  and  a  very  important  concession,  on 
the  part  of  perhaps  the  strongest  European  brain  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  to  the  very  doctrine  of  innate  ideas,  which 
it  elsewhere  repudiated.  "  Some  objects,"  Hume  says,  "  by 
the  structure  of  the  mind  are  naturally  calculated  to  give 
pleasure."  "Though  it  be  certain,"  he  adds,  "that  Beauty 
and  Deformity,  more  than  sweet  and  bitter,  are  not  qualities 
in  objects,  but  belong  entirely  to  sentiment,  it  must  be 
allowed  that  there  are  certain  qualities  in  objects  which  are 
fitted  by  Nature  to  produce  those  particular  feelings"  This 
is  every  way  a  most  significant  admission. 

The  essay  deals  further  with  the  things  which  tend  to 
make  Taste  delicate  and  accurate,  its  rapid  and  acute  per- 
ception of  minute  things,  its  training  by  long  practice,  its 
freedom  from  prejudice,  the  revision  of  its  judgments,  and 
the  comparison  of  varied  excellences.  Hume  affirms  that 
the  difficulty  of  finding  a  standard  of  Taste,  even  in  parti- 
culars, is  not  so  great  as  is  represented.  The  principles  of 

N 


1 78  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

Taste  are  "  uniform  in  Human  Nature."  They  are  "  uni- 
versal, and  nearly,  if  not  entirely,  the  same  in  all  men  "  ; 
and  he  expressly  contrasts  the  difficulty  of  finding  a 
standard  of  the  True  by  which  to  judge  the  systems  of 
Philosophy,  with  the  ease  with  which  a  trained  taste  can 
judge  a  work  of  Art. 

These  explicit  statements  by  Hume  should  have  saved 
him  from  the  indiscriminate  and  ignorant  charge  of  denying 
an  objective  standard.  It  would  have  been  a  much  wiser 
criticism  to  have  suggested  that  the  admission  he  made  of 
the  existence  of  a  universal  and  uniform  standard  of  Taste 
might  be  extended  from  the  realm  of  the  Beautiful  to  that 
of  the  True  and  the  Good ;  that  the  variety  in  the  verdicts 
of  men  in  the  latter  sphere  is  not  greater  than  in  the 
former ;  and  that  the  admission  of  a  standard  in  the  one 
case  suggests,  and  almost  logically  involves,  its  admission  in 
the  other.  In  reference  to  the  deeper  question  of  the 
origin  of  the  standard  Hume  is  of  course  silent. 

In  the  same  year  in  which  this  essay  of  Hume's 
appeared,  D'Alembert  read  to  the  French  Academy  his 
"  Reflections  on  the  use  and  abuse  of  Philosophy  in  matters 
of  Taste,"  and  Richard  Price — the  extreme  intellectualist 
amongst  the  eighteenth-century  moralists  of  England — 
issued  his  Review  of  the  Principal  Questions  of  Morals. 
In  the  second  chapter  of  Price's  "  review  "  there  is  a  dis- 
cussion "of  the  ideas  of  the  Beauty  and  Deformity  of 
actions."  Price's  position  was  a  curious  one.  He  con- 
sidered that  the  action,  both  of  the  understanding  and  of 
the  heart,  came  into  play  in  determining  the  moral  quality 
of  actions,  and  that  by  the  former  we  judge  of  them  as 
right  or  wrong,  by  the  latter  as  beautiful  or  base  ;  the  one 
faculty  (intellect)  deciding  as  to  the  St/couov  (the  right), 
and  the  other  faculty  (feeling)  deciding  as  to  the  KoAov 
(the  beauty).  He  agreed  with  Hutcheson  that  uniformity 
and  variety  was  the  source  of  the  Beauty  of  Nature ;  but  if 
we  go  on  to  ask  why  this  characteristic  of  Nature  pleases 
us,  he  did  not  think  we  require  to  bring  in  the  hypothesis 
of  an  internal  sense  to  explain  it,  because  the  objects  as 
such  have  this  quality  in  them.  If  there  be  uniformity 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  179 

within  the  variety  in  every  natural  object,  the  object  is 
more  easily  measured,  and  its  beauty  taken  in  by  us ; 
while  it  is  the  order  and  symmetry  of  objects  that  give 
them  strength  and  stability.  The  uniformity  is  as  necessary 
to  the  variety,  as  the  variety  is  to  the  uniformity  ;  and  Price 
held  that  natural  Beauty  was  a  quality  absolutely  inherent 
in  objects,  that  it  existed  in  them  whether  any  mind  per- 
ceived it  or  not. 

A  chapter  in  the  Theory  of  Moral  Sentiments  of  Adam 
Smith,  published  two  years  after  these  discussions  by  Hume 
and  Price  (1759),  must  not  be  overlooked  by  the  student 
of  the  history  of  aesthetic  doctrine  in  Britain.  It  is  the 
first  chapter  of  the  fifth  part  of  the  book,  and  is  entitled 
"  Of  the  influence  of  custom  and  fashion  upon  our  notions 
of  Beauty  and  Deformity.'3  Smith  gives  a  much  wider 
scope  to  their  influence  on  our  judgments  of  Beauty,  both 
in  Nature  and  in  Art,  than  Hume  did.  He  states  the 
theory  of  Pere  Buffier,1  but  he  is  unjust  in  his  inference 
that,  according  to  it,  the  whole  charm  of  the  Beautiful 
arises  from  the  habits  which  custom  imposes  on  the 
imagination.  Adam  Smith  no  more  admits  that  Beauty 
can  be  explained  by  custom  than  Buffier,  or  Price,  or 
Hume  had  done.  He  held  that  the  fitness  of  objects  for 
their  intended  end,  their  utility,  was  the  source  of  the 
Beauty,  independently  of  custom.  This  was  perhaps  a 
natural  conclusion  for  the  father  of  modern  Political 
Economy  to  come  to.  The  utilitarian  rule  was  that  by 
which  he  tested  most  things.  But  he  also  held  that  certain 
colours  were  intrinsically  beautiful,  that  smoothness  was 
naturally  more  agreeable  than  roughness,  and  variety  than 
uniformity. 

In  the  same  year  as  that  in  which  Smith's  book  appeared 
(1759),  Dr.  Alexander  Gerard  of  Aberdeen  published  his 
Essay  on   Taste,   an  acute   work  of  no  speculative   value. 
He  held  that  Beauty  is  of  many  kinds.     The  first  is  that/* 
of  Figure,  and  is  found  in  objects  which  have  uniformity,  ' 
variety,  and  proportion.      "  Uniformity,  when  unmixed,"  will  j 
"pall  upon  the  sense."     "Variety  is  necessary  to  enliven  j 
1  See  p.  98. 


180  TJie  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

!it";  but  "were  the  variety  boundless,  the  mind  would  be 
fatigued."  A  certain  deg'ree  of  uniformity  must  therefore 

;  be  blended  with  the  variety  of  objects.  These  two  qualities, 
by  moderating  one  another,  increase  the  pleasure  resulting 
from  each.  To  this  "proportion"  must  be  added,  or  a 
"general  aptitude  of  the  structure  to  the  end  proposed." 
In  marked  inconsistency  with  this  Gerard  sets  down 
"utility,  or  the  fitness  of  things  for  answering  their  ends," 
as  "another  species  of  Beauty."  "The  beauty  of  colour" 
he  finds  "  entirely  distinct  from  both  the  former,"  and  "  in 
most  instances  resolvable  into  association."  "  In  all  cases 
Beauty  is  at  least  in  part  resolvable  into  association." 

We  now  reach  the  work  of  another  English  artist,  Sir 
Joshua  Reynolds,  who  discussed  the  subject  of  Beauty  with 
more  rhetoric,  but  with  less  insight,  than  Hogarth  had  done. 
In  the  same  year  as  Smith's  Moral  Sentiments  appeared 
(1759),  Reynolds  wrote  a  paper  in  the  Idler  (No.  82)  on 
Beauty  ;  and  in  subsequent  years,  in  three  discourses  which 
he  delivered  to  the  students  of  the  Royal  Academy 
(1769  to  1790)  he  re-discussed  the  subject  under  many 
aspects.  Adopting  the  theory  of  Buffier  that  every  vital 
species,  animal  or  vegetable,  had  a  "fixed  or  determinate 
form,  towards  which  Nature  is  continually  inclining,"  and 
that  there  is  therefore  a  goal  of  Beauty  as  the  end  of 
Nature's  effort,  he  went  on,  not  to  develop  this  doctrine 
logically,  but  to  append  to  it  illogically  the  statement — which 
is  a  bare  unreasoned  assertion  on  his  part — that  we  admire 
Beauty  "  for  no  other  reason  than  that  we  are  used  to  it " ! 
He  added  :  "  I  have  no  doubt  that  if  we  were  more  used  to 
deformity  than  Beauty,  deformity  would  then  lose  the  idea 
now  annexed  to  it,  and  take  that  of  Beauty,  and  that  if  the 
whole  world  should  agree  that  yes  and  no  should  change 
their  meaning,  yes  would  then  deny,  and  no  would  affirm  " ! 
(P-  359)-  Such  a  position  scarcely  requires  any  comment. 
Reynolds  had  drunk  deeply  at  the  well  of  the  aufklarung, 
the  French  "enlightenment." 

Sir  Joshua  did  much  more  for  England  by  his  Art  than 
by  his  Discourses  upon  it.  He  has  charmed  posterity 
by  his  portraits,  and  by  his  skill  as  a  colourist,  but  he  has 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  181 

contributed  nothing  to  a  theory  of  the  Beautiful.  It  is 
curious  to  note,  however,  that  in  his  third  Discourse  he 
contradicts  the  principle  which  he  had  laid  down  in  his 
essay  in  the  Idler.  In  that  address,  delivered  in  1770 
(eleven  years  after  the  Magazine  article  appeared),  he 
wrote  : — 

Every  object  which  pleases  must  give  pleasure  upon  some  certain 
principles.  ...  In  every  particular  species  (of  being)  there  are 
various  central  forms  which  are  separate  and  distinct  from  each 
other,  and  yet  are  undeniably  beautiful.  ...  As  there  is  one 
general  form,  which  belongs  to  the  human  kind  at  large,  so  in 
each  class  there  is  a  common  idea,  or  central  form,  which  is  the 
abstract  of  the  various  individual  forms  belonging  to  that  class.  .  .  . 
Perfect  Beauty,  in  my  opinion,  must  combine  all  the  characters 
which  are  beautiful  in  that  species.  It  cannot  consist  in  any  one, 
to  the  exclusion  of  the  rest.  No  one  therefore  must  be  predominant, 
that  no  one  may  be  deficient. 

He  goes  on  to  speak  of  the  education  of  the  artist 
necessitating  a  knowledge  of  the  difference  between  "the 
genuine  habits  of  Nature  as  distinguished  from  those  of 
fashion,"  and  in  this  connection  refers  to  the  saying  attri- 
buted to  Zeuxis,  in  aeternitatem  pingo. 

In  another  Discourse — the  seventh,  delivered  in  1776 — 
Reynolds  discusses  the  question  of  the  reality  of  a  standard 
of  Taste,  and  he  defends  it.  He  says  that  caprice  and 
casualty  would  govern  the  Arts  if  there  were  no  settled 
principles  in  them,  and  he  actually  affirms  that  Beauty  and 
Nature  "  are  but  different  names  for  expressing  the  same 
thing."  "The  works  of  Nature,  if  w.e  compare  one  species' 
with  another,  are  all  equally  beautiful ;  and  in  creatures  of 
the  same  species,  Beauty  is  the  medium  or  centre  of  all  its 
various  forms."  Again  :  "  The  most  general  form  of  Nature 
is  the  most  beautiful."  This,  if  carried  out  logically, 
would  be  very  much  the  same  as  affirming  that  Beauty  is 
the  perfect  mean  between  all  extremes.  In  the  eighth 
Discourse  (1780)  he  deals  with  "the  Principles  of  Art," 
to  show  that  they  have  their  foundation  in  mind.  In  the 
tenth  he  objects  to  imitation  as  the  end  of  Art — a  subject 
resumed  in  the  thirteenth  (in  1786). 


1 82  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

In  Sir  Joshua's  notes  to  Mason's  translation  of  Dufres- 
noy's  De  Arte  Graphica,  he  alludes  to  the  same  subject,  e.g. 
"  We  can  no  more  form  any  idea  of  Beauty  superior  to 
Nature  than  we  can  form  an  idea  of  a  sixth  sense,  or  any 
other  excellence,  out  of  the  limits  of  the  human  mind. 
Nothing  can  be  so  unphilosophical  as  a  supposition  that 
we  can  form  any  idea  of  Beauty  or  excellence  out  of  or 
beyond  Nature,  which  is,  and  must  be,  the  fountain-head 
from  whence  all  our  ideas  must  be  derived." 


4.  Lord  K aimes  to  Thomas  Reid 

In  1762,  Henry  Home  (Lord  Kaimes)  published  his 
Elements  of  Criticism.  Kaimes  was  an  accomplished  Scot- 
tish lawyer,  and  a  man  of  wide  culture  ;  but  notwithstand- 
ing the  praise  of  Dugald  Stewart  (which  was  largely  the 
exaggeration  of  friendship),  he  did  not  do  much  to  advance 
the  subject  he  discussed.  He  limited  the  objects  which  are 
beautiful  to  those  which  appeal  to  our  sense  of  sight. 
What  appeals  to  us  through  the  ear  may  be  agreeable,  but 
it  is  not  beautiful.  It  is  only  by  a  figure  of  speech  that 
sounds,  thoughts,  theorems,  or  events  can  be  said  to  be  beau- 
tiful. The  objects  of  sight  are  more  simple  than  those  of  any 
other  sense  ;  and  their  beauty  is  either  intrinsic  or  relative. 
Intrinsic  Beauty  is  in  an  object,  as  one  of  sense,  and  is 
ultimate.  Relative  Beauty  is  in  an  object,  as  a  means  to 
an  end,  a  purpose.  When  the  Beauty  of  an  effect  is  trans- 
ferred to  its  cause,  then  an  object,  in  itself  void  of  intrinsic 
beauty,  appears  beautiful  from  its  utility.  Lord  Kaimes 
analyses  the  beauty  both  of  colour  and  of  figure.  The  latter 
arises,  he  thinks,  from  regularity,  uniformity,  proportion, 
order,  and  simplicity.  Many  of  his  remarks  on  the  superior 
beauty  of  the  square  to  the  triangle,  etc.,  are  foundationless  ; 
and  he  asks  at  the  close  of  his  chapter  on  this  subject 
whether  Beauty  is  a  primary  or  only  a  secondary  quality 
of  objects.  Colour  being  admittedly  a  secondary  quality, 
existing  only  in  the  mind  of  the  spectator,  the  beauty  of 
colour  must  also  be  subjective.  The  beauty  of  form  is  the 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  183 

same,  "for  an  object  is  said  to  be  beautiful  for  no  other 
reason  but  that  it  appears  so  to  a  spectator."  It  is  not, 
and  "  cannot  be  an  inherent  property,"  either  in  "  the  per- 
cipient, or  in  the  object  perceived." 

In  his  analysis  of  Grandeur  and  Sublimity,  Kaimes  simply 
brought  in  the  element  of  size,  or  mass.  If  the  qualities 
that  go  to  make  an  object  beautiful  are  present  in  quantity,  or 
if  the  object  be  vast,  and  other  qualities  be  superadded,  the 
emotions,  first  of  grandeur,  and  then  of  sublimity,  are  evoked. 

In  William  Shen stone's  Essays  on  Men,  Manners,  and 
Things  (1764)  there  is  an  "Essay  on  Taste." 

The  object  of  Taste  is  corporal  beauty.  All  beauty  is 
either  absolute,  relative,  or  a  compound  of  both.  Every- 
thing derives  its  pretension  to  beauty  on  account  of  its 
colour,  smoothness,  variety,  uniformity,  partial  resemblance 
to  something  else,  perfection,  or  suitableness  to  the  end 
proposed,  some  connection  of  ideas,  or  a  mixture  of  all 
these.  Habit  has  an  influence  over  taste  to  which  we  can 
affix  no  bounds.  The  most  perfect  health  is  the  most  per- 
fect beauty.  An  obvious  connection  may  be  traced  between 
physical  and  moral  beauty.  These  are  samples  of  the 
commonplaces  of  Shenstone.  He  affirms  that  our  ideas  of 
beauty  depend  greatly  upon  habit,  and  yet  admits  that  there 
is  a  beauty  in  some  forms  which  is  independent  of  their  use. 

In  1 768,  Abraham  Tucker  published  his  Light  of  Nature 
purstied,  under  the  pseudonym  of  Edward  Search.  In  the 
twenty-second  chapter  of  the  first  volume,  entitled  "  Plea- 
sure," he  discusses  the  subject  of  Beauty,  adopting  the  then 
dominant  empirical  view.  "  Nothing  is  beautiful  in  itself :  ' 
those  things  bid  fairest  for  the  title  that  are  adapted  to 
please  the  generality  of  mankind  "  (§  4).  "  Our  sense  of 
Beauty  was  not  born  with  us,  but  grows  by  time,  and  may 
be  moulded  into  almost  any  shape  by  custom,  convention, 
or  accident."  "  There  seem  to  be  four  principal  sources 
from  whence  the  efficiency  of  Beauty  derives  :  composition, 
succession,  translation,  and  expression"  (§  5).  The  first 
and  last  of  these  are  evident  enough.  By  the  second 
Tucker  refers  to  variety,  not  mere  novelty,  but  such  a 
change  as  prevents  monotony.  By  the  third  he  refers  to 


184  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

'the  power  of  association,  in  transferring  what  belongs  to 
an  effect  to  its  cause,  or  in  investing  objects  with  charms 
not  originally  theirs.  He  explicitly  combats  the  Platonic 
doctrine  of  an  absolute  and  essential  Beauty  existing  in 
objects  independent  of  the  subject. 

A  Scotch  artist  and  writer,  John  Donaldson  (1751-1801), 
issued  a  small  book  in  1780  which  he  called  The  Elements 
of  Beauty  ;  also  reflections  on  the  harmony  of  the  Sensibility 
and  Reason.  He  considered  it  "  the  common  error  of  most 
of  our  modern  writers  on  Beauty  "  that  they  have  supposed 
all  beautiful  things  "  subject  to  one  fixed  principle,  relative 
to  sense."  "  Taste,"  he  says,  "  prevents  judgment,  and 
is  more  beholden  to  sentiment  than  to  experience.  There 
is,  however,  a  perfect  agreement  between  right  reason  and 
true  taste.  They  are  reciprocal  tests  of  each  other's  validity  " 
(p.  6).  "  Qualities  of  objects,  so  far  as  they  relate  to  Beauty, 
are  either  such  as  most  clearly  excite  perception  or  life 
in  the  senses,  or  an  expression  of  life  or  sensibility  "  (p.  9). 
He  discusses  light,  sound,  motion,  assimilation,  contrast, 
personification,  character  and  expression,  and  gracefulness. 
Although  not  a  contribution  to  philosophical  theory,  the 
book  contains  some  happy  statements,  e.g.  "We  cannot 
judge  of  anything  but  by  relation,  and  it  is  in  the  changes 
of  things  that  we  perceive  them"  (p.  21).  "What  pleases 
one  sense  comes  as  it  were  recommended  to  the  rest" 
(p.  32).  "  Imagination  in  all  its  conjunctions  acts  like  a 
skilful  musician,  proceeding  by  the  rule  of  contraries " 
(p.  43).  "  Everything  that  assails  the  senses  violently  is 
personified  ;  and  life,  clad  in  the  armour  of  the  foe,  is 
turned  against  itself." 

James  Beattie,  the  somewhat  prosaic  occupant  of  the 
Chair  of  Philosophy  in  Aberdeen  from  1760  to  1787,  and 
author  of  the  Essay  on  Truth,  also  wrote  a  series  of 
Dissertations,  Moral  and  Critical,  which  appeared  in  1783, 
and  in  which  we  find  an  anticipation  of  much  that  Alison  and 
others  subsequently  wrought  out.  The  first  of  his  Disserta- 
tions is  on  "  Memory  and  Imagination  "  ;  and  in  the  fourth 
section  of  the  second  chapter  of  the  essay  on  Imagination 
he  discusses  the  origin  of  our  ideas  of  Beauty  in  Colour, 


xii  The  P  kilos  op  ky  of  Britain  185 

Figure,  Attitude,  and  Motion,  which  he  partly  accounts 
for  from  the  influence  of  "  custom,  as  an  associating  prin- 
ciple." "  In  all  cases,  it  seems  possible  to  account  for 
them,"  i.e.  our  ideas  of  Beauty,  "  upon  the  principle  of  asso- 
ciation, except  perhaps  in  that  single  one  of  colours  giving 
pleasure,  and  being  called  beautiful,  merely  because  they 
are  bright,  or  because  they  are  delicate"  (p.  142). 

Beattie  seems  to  admit  that  Symmetry  is  in  itself  beau- 
tiful ;  but  he  contends  that  Utility  is  essential  to  beautiful 
things  (p.  115).  He  endorses  Hogarth's  "line  of  beauty," 
but  brings  in  custom  and  association  to  explain  our  delight 
in  it.  The  beauty  of  gesture  or  movement  is  wholly  due 
to  what  it  suggests ;  but  he  distinguishes  "  expression " 
from  "beauty,"  and  considers  that  many  very  expressive 
things  are  not  beautiful ;  although  the  beauty  of  others, 
such  as  the  human  eye,  depends  upon  their  expression. 
Regularity  of  feature  is  beautiful,  because  it  "betokens  anr 
even  temper,  and  the  absence  of  those  passions  by  which  the 
features  are  made  irregular"  (p.  136).  Beattie,  however, 
contends  for  a  standard  of  Beauty.  "Beauty  cannot  be 
perceived  without  (the  requisite)  percipient  faculties" 
(p.  141).  He  discusses  the  subject  elsewhere  indirectly, 
in  his  "  Illustrations  of  Sublimity."  He  has  hardly  got  his 
due,  as  a  precursor  of  the  later  associationalists. 

The  idealistic  attitude  of  mind,  never  wholly  absent 
from  the  Celtic  race,  and  repressed  rather  by  foreign  influ- 
ence than  by  native  tendency  in  Scotland,  at  length  found 
expression  in  the  philosophical  teaching  of  her  Universities. 

In  1785,  Dr.  Thomas  Reid — the  typical  "common-sense" 
philosopher  of  Britain,  and  teacher  of  it  both  at  Aberdeen 
and  Glasgow  —  published  his  Essays  on  the  Intellectual 
Powers,  in  one  section  of  which  he  discussed  the  Beautiful. 
He  starts  by  assuming  the  existence  of  a  power  of  the  mind 
by  which  we  discern  and  relish  the  Beauty  of  Nature,  and 
begins  by  comparing  it  with  other  "tastes."  He  finds  a' 
judgment  as  to  the  beauty  of  objects  implied  in  the  opera- 
tions of  this  power  or  faculty.  This  "judgment  of  Beauty  " 
is  accompanied  by  a  feeling  or  emotion,  a  "  sense  of 
beauty."  In  his  analysis  of  the  things  in  Nature  "which 


1 86  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

please  a  good  taste,"  and  call  forth  this  judgment  and 
feeling,  Reid  followed  the  defective  classification  of  Addi- 
son  and  Akenside,  viz.  novelty,  grandeur,  and  beauty, 
just  as  in  another  part  of  this  discussion  he  somewhat 
slavishly  followed  the  ground -plan  of  the  author  of  Crito 
(see  p.  172).  He  seems,  however,  at  once  to  perceive  its  in- 
adequacy, because  he  goes  on  to  say  that  Novelty  "  is  not 
properly  a  quality  of  the  thing  to  which  we  attribute  it," 
but  is  "  a  relation  which  the  thing  has  to  the  knowledge  of 
the  person."  That  a  thing  which  is  new  interests  us, 
is  a  very  commonplace  observation.  Reid's  analysis  of 
"  grandeur  "  may  be  passed  over. 

It  is  in  his  fourth  chapter,  "  Of  Beauty,"  that  he  seems 
for  the  first  time  to  see  the  real  point  of  the  difficulty, 
when  he  remarks  (as  indeed  many  had  done  before  him) 
that  while  there  is  beauty  in  colour,  sound,  form,  and 
motion,  in  truth,  action,  affection,  and  character,  the  ques- 
tion is  "Is  there  any  quality  the  same  in  all,  which  we 
may  call  by  the  name  of  Beauty  ? "  He  can  find  none. 
There  is  no  identity  or  even  similarity  in  the  beauty  of  a 
theorem  and  the  beauty  of  a  piece  of  music  ;  and  he  gives 
us  the  reason  why  we  call  such  different  things  by  a  com- 
mon name — (i)  that  they  both  produce  an  agreeable 
emotion,  and  (2)  that  this  is  conjoined  with  a  belief  that 
they  possess  some  inherent  excellence.  This  is  "  a  second 
ingredient  in  our  sense  of  Beauty."  When  objects  strike 
us  at  once  as  beautiful,  our  judgment  as  to  them  is  instinct- 
ive :  others  are  only  deemed  beautiful  when  we  can  ration- 
ally explain  their  Beauty,  or  how  we  came  to  regard  them 
as  beautiful ;  and  so,  Beauty  itself  may  be  distinguished  as 
original  and  derived.  The  one  shines  by  its  own  light,  the 
other  by  borrowed  or  reflected  light.  Thus,  we  transfer  the 
beauty  of  the  sign  to  the  thing  signified,  of  the  cause  to  the 
effect,  of  the  end  to  the  means,  of  the  agent  to  the  instrument. 

Trying  next  to  determine  the  qualities  in  objects  to 
which  Beauty  may  be  rationally  ascribed,  he  finds  that  it 
is  in  qualities  of  mind  that  original  Beauty  is  to  be  found, 
and  that  in  the  objects  of  Nature  the  beauty  is  "  derived 
from  some  relation  they  bear  to  mind."  He  quotes  the 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  187 

lines  of  Akenside  as  to  Mind,  and  mind  alone,  being  "  the 
living  fountain "  of  the  beautiful ;  and  adds  that  it  is  a 
beautiful  character  that  primarily  awakens  in  us  the  feeling 
and  the  judgment  of  Beauty,  while  "  every  object  of  sense 
is  beautified  by  borrowing  attire  from  the  attributes  of 
mind."  Inanimate  matter  is  made  beautiful  by  the  possession 
of  qualities  that  resemble  mind.  Music  is  most  expressive 
when  it  shadows  forth  human  sentiment,  emotion,  or  passion. 
An  external  object  is  most  beautiful  when  its  form  is  most 
fitted  for  the  end  it  is  destined  to  subserve,  and  that  kind 
of  fitness  is  a  mental  quality  ;  while  the  greatest  Beauty 
of  all  lies  in  expression,  which  again  is  a  mental  quality. 

On  the  whole  there  is  in  Reid  a  curious  mixture  of 
shrewd  insight,  limited  by  the  horizon  of  Scottish  idiosyn- 
crasy, with  vague  platitude.  At  times  he  seems  the  very 
incarnation  of  commonplace,  and  again  there  are  width, 
penetration,  and  flashes  of  real  insight,  which  make  his 
discussion  a  valuable  one. 


5.  Alison  to  W.  Thomson 

While  the  intuitional  and  a  priori  teaching  of  Reid  (and 
others)  held  its  own  in  the  north,  a  reaction  from  it  was 
also  inevitable.  The  influence  of  Hume  and  Smith  was 
intellectually  a  much  stronger  one  than  that  of  Reid ;  and 
the  unconscious  presence  of  the  opposite  type  of  philosophis- 
ing, in  the  minds  of  many  who  were  unaware  of  it,  wrought 
out  results  opposed  to  the  admission  of  an  objective  standard 
of  Beauty.  The  principle  of  Association  was  brought 
forward  (with  more  explicitness  and  more  apparent  success 
than  ever  before)  to  explain  the  formation  of  those  judg- 
ments that  seemed  innate  and  intuitive.  The  writer  who 
led  the  way  in  developing  this  empirical  psychology,  and 
applying  it  in  the  sphere  of  aesthetic,  was  Alison.  In  1790 
he  published  an  Essay  on  the  Nature  and  Principles  of  Taste. 
A  second  edition  appeared  in  two  volumes  in  1811,  when  it 
was  criticised  by  Jeffrey  in  the  Edinburgh  Review,  and  this 
review  article  Jeffrey  expanded  into  an  encyclopaedia  one 
for  the  sixth  edition  of  the  Britannica,  in  the  year  1824. 


1 88  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

Alison's  aim  was  to  analyse  the  emotions  of  Sublimity 
and  Beauty,  with  the  view  of  showing  that  they  are  not  simple 
but  complex  emotions,  and  "involve  in  all  cases  (i)  the 
production  of  some  simple  emotion,  or  the  exercise  of  some 
moral  affection,  and  (2)  a  peculiar  exercise  of  the  imagina- 
tion ;  and  that  the  peculiar  pleasure  of  the  Beautiful  or 
Sublime  is  only  felt  when  these  two  are  conjoined,  and  a 
complex  emotion  produced."  Alison  denies  the  existence 
i  of  any  quality  in  objects  which  makes  them  beautiful.  Their 
beauty  is  entirely  due  to  the  influence  of  the  principle  of 
;  association.  With  great  wealth  of  illustration  he  traces  the 
working  of  this  principle,  in  local  associations,  historical  ones, 
etc.  He  applies  it  first  to  the  sublimity  and  beauty  of  the 
material  world,  to  sounds,  the  notes  of  animals,  the  tones  of 
the  human  voice,  and  to  music ;  next  to  the  object  of  sight, 
colours  and  forms.  He  traces  the  influence  of  Design, 
fitness  and  utility,  on  the  beauty  of  forms,  especially  of  the 
human  form  and  countenance,  and  at  the  end  of  his  discussion 
he  says  :  "  The  conclusion  in  which  I  wish  to  rest  is  that 
the  beauty  and  sublimity  which  is  felt  in  the  various  ap- 
pearances of  matter  are  finally  to  be  ascribed  to  their 
expression  of  mind,  or  to  their  being  either  directly  or  in- 
directly the  signs  of  these  qualities  of  mind  which  are 
fitted  by  the  constitution  of  our  nature  to  affect  us  with 
pleasing  or  interesting  emotion"  (vol.  ii.  p.  423).  All  of 
this,  however,  is  irrelevant  to  the  problem  in  debate. 

A  letter  from  Robert  Burns  to  Alison,  dated  Ellisland, 
Feb.  1791,  maybe  referred  to  in  passing.  Alison  had  sent 
Burns  a  copy  of  his  book.  In  acknowledging  it,  he  said  : 
"  Except  Euclid's  Elements  of  Geometry,  I  never  read  a  book 
which  gave  me  such  a  quantum  of  information,  and  added 
so  much  to  my  stock  of  ideas,  as  your  Essays  on  the 
Principles  of  Taste."  The  letter  is  satirical. 

As  it  was  a  sequel  to  Alison's,  Lord  Jeffrey's  Essay  on 
Beatify  may  be  referred  to  somewhat  out  of  its  chronological 
order.  It  was  based  upon,  and  it  almost  entirely  endorses, 
Alison's  theory,  in  opposition  to  the  existence  of  any  in- 
trinsic beauty  in  objects.  It  is  thus  that  Jeffrey  defines  his 
'position: — "Our  sense  of  beauty  depends  entirely  on  our 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  189 

previous  experience  of  simpler  pleasures  or  emotions,  andi 
consists  in  the  suggestion  of  agreeable  and  interesting  sensa- 
tions with  which  we  had  formerly  been  made  familiar,  by 
the  direct  agency  of  our  common  sensibilities  ;  and  that 
vast  variety  of  objects  to  which  we  give  the  common  name 
of  beautiful  become  entitled  to  that  appellation  merely 
because  they  all  possess  the  power  of  recalling  or  reflecting 
those  sensations  of  which  they  have  been  the  accompani- 
ments, or  with  which  they  have  been  associated  in  our 
imagination  by  any  other  more  casual  bond  of  connection." 
And  so  on,  and  so  on,  and  so  on.  Jeffrey's  theory  is  an  ' 
irrelevancy  from  first  to  last,  even  more  than  Alison's. 

In  1792,  William  Gilpin,  Prebendary  of  Sarum,  and  Vicar 
of  Boldre  in  the  New  Forest,  wrote  Three  Essays  on 
Picturesque  Beatify,  etc.  He  thought  that  disputes  about 
Beauty  might  be  lessened  "  if  a  distinction  were  established 
between  such  objects  as  are  beautiful,  and  such  as  are 
picturesque ;  between  those  which  please  the  eye  in  their 
natural  state,  and  those  which  please  from  some  quality 
capable  of  being  illustrated  in  painting."  His  chief  inquiry 
was  as  to  "that  quality  in  objects  which  marks  them  as 
picturesque."  Beautiful  objects  are  usually,  though  not/ 
always,  smooth  ;  picturesque  objects  are  the  reverse,  they  \ 
are  rough  or  rugged.  Thus  while  a  temple  newly  built 
may  be  beautiful,  as  a  ruin  it  is  picturesque.  So  with  garden 
ground,  and  so  with  the  human  face  and  figure  ;  when 
smooth  they  are  beautiful,  when  rough  and  rugged  they  are 
picturesque.  In  rough  and  rugged  objects  we  have  the 
variety  and  contrasts  which  are  wanting  in  smooth  ones  ; 
we  have  also  greater  light  and  shade,  less  uniformity,  and/ 
more  varied  colouring.  He  proceeds  to  ask  why  the 
quality  of  roughness  should  make  an  essential  difference" 
between  the  objects  in  Nature  that  are  picturesque,  and 
those  of  Art.  He  finds  no  solution,  and  gives  up  the 
inquiry  into  first  principles  in  art,  as  in  metaphysics  and 
ethics,  as  an  impossible  one. 

In  1794,  Uvedale  Price  issued  an  Essay  on  the  Pictur- 
esque,  as  compared  with  the  Sublime  and  the  Beautiful^  which 
passed  through  several  editions.  It  was  followed  in  1795 


1 90  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

by  a  supplement  on  the  application  of  the  Principles  of 
Landscape  Painting  to  Landscape  Gardening,  in  reply  to 
Mr.  H.  Repton;  and  in  1801  by  a  Dialogue,  on  the 
distinct  characters  of  the  Picturesque  and  the  Beautiful,  in 
answer  to  Payne  Knight.  These  works  of  Sir  Uvedale 
Price  were  re-edited,  in  1842,  with  an  introductory  essay  on 
the  origin  of  Taste,  by  Sir  Thomas  Dick  Lauder. 

Uvedale  Price  defines  the  picturesque  as  "everything  that 
can  be  represented  with  good  effect  in  painting"  (ch.  iii.). 
He  thinks  the  definition  of  Gilpin  "at  once  too  vague  and 
too  confined."  He  held  that  the  picturesque  had  a  char- 
acter "  separate  and  distinct  from  the  beautiful  and  the 
sublime,"  and  "  independent  of  the  art  of  painting."  He 
objects  to  the  combination  of  the  two  words  in  the  phrase 
"picturesque  beauty"  as  tending  to  mislead,  because  the 
picturesque  "not  only  differs  from  the  beautiful,"  "but 
•  arises  from  qualities  the  most  diametrically  opposite."  He 
follows  Gilpin 1  in  believing  that  "  roughness,  and  sudden 
variation,  with  irregularity,  are  the  most  efficient  causes  of 
the  picturesque."  "  Time  converts  a  beautiful  object  into  a 
picturesque  one."  Picturesqueness  holds  a  station  between 
beauty  and  sublimity"  (ch.  iv.),  "and,  on  that  account,  is 
more  frequently  and  more  happily  blended  with  them  both 
than  they  are  with  each  other.  It  is,  however,  perfectly 
distinct  from  either." 

Price  says  of  Beauty  and  Picturesqueness  that  they  are 
"  founded  on  opposite  qualities  ;  the  one  on  smoothness,  the 
other  on  roughness ;  the  one  on  gradual,  the  other  on  sudden 
variation ;  the  one  on  ideas  of  youth  and  freshness,  the  other 
on  those  of  age  and  even  of  decay  "  (ch.  iv.).  The  Beautiful 
is  symmetrical,  but  "symmetry  is  adverse  to  the  picturesque." 
The  picturesque  is  equally  distinct  from  the  sublime. 
Greatness  of  dimension  is  a  cause  of  the  sublime;  it  has  no 
connection  with  the  picturesque.  The  intricacy  and  variety 
which  characterise  the  latter  can  be  found  equally  in  the 
grandest  and  the  gayest  scenery.  Infinity,  boundlessness 
is  one  cause  of  the  sublime  ;  but  it  is  on  definite  shape  and 

1  Although  he  tells  us  that  a  great  part  of  his  book  was  written  before 
he  saw  Gilpin's  essay. 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  191 

boundaries  that  picturesqueness  depends.  Uniformity  is' 
often  the  cause  of  sublimity,  the  picturesque  requires  variety ; 
and  while  the  sublime  is  austere,  the  picturesque  captivates. 
But  "it  seldom  happens  that  the  two  qualities"  (the  beauti- 
ful and  the  picturesque)  "  are  perfectly  unmixed."  "  Nature 
has  blended  them"  (ch.  v.).  "The  picturesque  fills  up  a 
vacancy  between  the  sublime  and  the  beautiful"  (ch.  vi.). 
"  Smoothness  is  the  groundwork  of  Beauty,  yet  roughness  is 
its  fringe  and  ornament,  and  that  which  preserves  it  from 
insipidity."  "The  charm  of  smoothness  is  that  it  conveys 
the  idea  of  repose,  of  roughness  that  it  gives  that  of  anima- 
tion and  variety." 

Price  next  discusses  light  and  shade,  the  difference 
between  the  beautiful  and  the  picturesque  in  colour,  and  in 
his  ninth  chapter  deals  with  ugliness.  "  Deformity  is  to 
ugliness  what  picturesqueness  is  to  beauty."  Perhaps  the 
most  interesting  section  of  his  treatise  is  the  concluding 
chapters  in  which  he  discusses  the  principles  of  Landscape 
Gardening,  especially  his  treatment  of  the  subject  of  Trees 
as  ornament,  whether  in  clump,  or  belt,  or  avenue,  and  the 
general  effects  of  water  on  landscape. 

In  a  printed  letter  addressed  to  Price  by  Mr.  H.  Repton 
in  July  1794,  his  theory  of  "deducing  landscape  gardening 
from  painting  "  was  vigorously  replied  to.  Price  rejoined  in 
a  treatise,  called  A  Letter  to  H.  Repton,  Esq.,  in  which  the 
picturesque  in  landscape  gardening  is  discussed  in  detail, 
and  in  which  he  maintains  that  the  best  landscape  artists 
would  be  the  best  landscape  gardeners  were  they  to  devote 
themselves  to  it.  Price  also  wrote  three  essays,  on  Arti- 
ficial Water,  on  Decorations  near  the  House,  and  on 
Architecture  and  Buildings;  and  in  1801  a  Dialogue 
on  the  distinct  characters  of  the  Picturesque  and  Beautiful. 
This  was  written  in  answer  to  the  objections  of  Payne  Knight, 
given  in  a  note  to  the  second  edition  of  his  poem  The 
Landscape,  in  which  he  tried  to  show  that  Price's  distinction 
between  the  beautiful  and  the  picturesque  was  imaginary. 
It  was  prefaced  by  an  Introductory  Essay  on  Beauty,  with 
"remarks  on  the  ideas  of  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds  and  Mr.  Burke 
upon  that  subject."  This  essay  contains  an  acute,  and  on 


192  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

the  whole  a  sympathetic  estimate  of  the  theories  of  Sir 
Joshua  and  Burke  ;  while  differing  from  them  on  several 
points.  Price  quotes  Sir  Joshua's  fifty-sixth  note  on  Du- 
fresnoy,  in  which  he  says  :  "  A  flowing  outline  is  recom- 
mended, because  Beauty — which  alone  is  Nature — cannot 
be  produced  without  it ;  old  age  or  illness  produce  straight 
lines,  corpulency  round  lines,  but  in  a  state  of  health 
accompanying  growth,  the  outlines  are  waving,  flowing,  and 
serpentine  "  ;  and  he  seems  to  admit  that  the  highest  beauty 
must  conform  to  rule,  the  rule  of  a  "  central  form,"  and  the 
qualities  which  "  constitute  the  beautiful  are  in  all  objects 
chiefly  found  to  exist  at  that  period  when  Nature  has  at- 
tained, but  not  passed,  a  state  of  perfect  completion." 
Price's  Dialogue  is  of  less  value  than  his  essays. 

In  connection  with  these  discussions  on  the  picturesque 
a  Letter  to  Mr.  Repton  from  the  Right  Honourable  William 
Wyndham  should  not  be  overlooked.  He  held,  in  opposition 
to  Price,  that  grounds  should  not  be  laid  out  with  a  view  to 
their  appearance  in  a  picture,  but  solely  with  a  view  "  to 
their  uses,  and  enjoyment  in  real  life  ;  and  their  conformity 
to  these  purposes  constitutes  their  true  beauty."  Mr.  Repton, 
in  his  Sketches  and  Hints  on  Landscape  Gardening, 
endorses  this. 

A  work  on  the  Beautiful  that  is  little  known  was  pub- 
lished eight  years  after  Alison's,  viz.  in  1798,  by  William 
Thomson,  an  Irish  scholar  and  artist  (1726-1798).  One  of 
Thomson's  pictures  attracted  the  attention  of  Reynolds,  but 
he  had  no  success  as  a  painter.  His  book  is  called  An 
Enquiry  into  the  elementary  principles  of  Beauty,  in  the 
Works  of  Nature  and  Art.  It  is  prefaced  by  an  "  Introduc- 
tory Discourse  on  Taste,"  in  which  the  various  faculties  are 
discussed  seriatim  (perception,  memory,  imagination,  taste, 
judgment),  with  a  view  to  determine  in  what  the  faculty  of 
taste  consists,  whether  it  can  be  developed,  and  whether  it 
is  a  universal  faculty  inherent  in  all,  or  only  in  a  few.  The 
rest  of  the  book  is  a  discussion  on  "  the  elementary  prin- 
'ciples  of  the  Beautiful."  Thomson  finds  that  it  is  the  result 
jof  "  six  different  accidents  or  elementary  principles,  each  of 
which  is  a  distinct  beauty  in  itself,  and  consequently  com- 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  193 

municates  a  peculiar  Beauty  to  every  object  to  which  it  is' 
joined.  All  beings,  inanimate  as  well  as  animate,  have  one 
or  more  of  these  six  beauties,  and  each  of  these  elementary 
principles  which  is  added  after  the  first  (which  none  are  or 
can  be  without)  increases  its  beauty  by  the  addition  of  such 
element.  It  follows  that  the  creature  or  element  which 
possesses  all  the  elementary  principles  is  most  or  perfectly 
beautiful ;  while  the  creature  or  object  which  possesses 
only  one  element  is  least  beautiful ;  and  if  there  be  any 
creature  or  object  which  possesses  more  it  must  be  ugly, 
deformed,  or  monstrous"  (pp.  101,  102). 

The  six  elementary  principles  of  Beauty  are — (i)  The,' 
beauty  of  proportion  or  fitness,  (2)  the  beauty  of  shape,  (3) 
the  beauty  of  lines,  (4)  the  beauty  of  colours,  (5)  the  beauty 
of  variety,  (6)  the  beauty  of  smoothness.  Thomson; 
thought  that  the  creature  which  possessed  beauty  of 
"  shape,"  in  addition  to  that  of  "  fitness,"  was,  on  that 
account,  a  stage  higher  in  the  scale  of  beauty  ;  that  those 
creatures  which,  in  addition,  had  the  "beauty  of  the  S-like 
line,"  had  beauty  in  the  third  degree  ;  further,  that  those 
which  had  beauty  of  colour  were  in  the  fourth  degree  ;  and 
that  those  which,  over  and  above,  had  the  beauty  of  variety 
and  of  smoothness,  had  beauty  of  the  fifth  and  sixth 
degree.  All  this  is  quite  arbitrary.  No  creature  that  has 
proportion  is  without  beauty  of  shape,  line,  colour,  and 
variety.  Thomson  himself  admits  (p.  182)  that  "variety  is 
not  a  definite  element  like  the  others,  but  an  occasional 
mode  or  accident,  by  which  the  Beauty  of  the  other  elements 
is  heightened  or  increased."  The  book  had  neither  specu- 
lative nor  literary  merit  to  outlast  its  generation. 


6.  Erasmus  Darwin  to  S.  T.  Coleridge 

Erasmus  Darwin  (1731-1802)  first  published  his  Zoo- 
nomia;  or  the  Laws  of  Organic  Life  in  1794-6.  In  the 
third  edition,  1801  (§  xvi.  6,  i)  there  is  a  slight  discussion 
on  Beauty.  His  explanation  of  its  origin  is  purely  physical. 
"  The  characteristic  of  Beauty  is  that  it  is  the  object  of  love ;  <; 

O 


194  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

and  though  many  other  objects  are  in  common  language 
called  beautiful,  yet  they  are  only  called  so  metaphorically, 
and  ought  to  be  termed  agreeable."  Neither  a  Greek 
temple  nor  a  Gothic  cathedral,  neither  music  nor  poetry, 
can  be  termed  beautiful,  except  metaphorically,  because 
"  we  have  no  wish  to  embrace  or  salute  them  "  !  "  Our 
perception  of  Beauty  consists  in  our  recognition  by  the 
sense  of  vision  of  those  objects,  first,  which  have  before 
inspired  our  love  by  the  pleasure  they  have  afforded  to 
many  of  our  senses  (as  to  our  sense  of  warmth,  of  touch, 
of  smell,  of  taste,  hunger  and  thirst)  ;  and,  secondly,  which 
bear  any  analogy  of  form  to  such  objects."  And  so  he 
finds  that  the  infant's  experience  of  smoothness,  softness, 
and  warmth  when  it  receives  nourishment  leads  it  after- 
wards to  find  delight  in  objects  that  are  smooth,  soft,  and 
warm.  Erasmus  Darwin's  explanation  of  Beauty,  as  thus 
traceable  to  a  material  source,  has  been  more  fully  wrought 
out  in  the  next  generation  by  his  son  Charles  and  others, 
and  by  them  presented  in  a  more  scientific  form  ;  but  the 
groundwork  of  the  theory  is  the  same  in  Zoonomia  as  in 
The  Descent  of  Man. 

Henry  Fuselli  (or  Fusseli),  a  Swiss  naturalised  in 
England,  friend  of  Lavater  and  of  Reynolds,  became,  in 
1799,  Professor  of  Painting  and  Keeper  of  the  Royal 
Academy  in  London.  In  his  twenty-third  year  he  trans- 
lated Winckelmann's  Reflections  on  the  Painting  and  Sculp- 
ture of  the  Greeks  (which  was  published  in  1765).  He 
delivered  a  course  of  lectures  on  invention,  expression, 
design,  colouring,  etc.,  to  the  pupils  of  the  Academy  during 
the  tenure  of  his  office.  They  were  published  in  1801. 
In  his  seventh  lecture  he  says  :  "  The  notion  of  Beauty 
arises  from  the  pleasure  we  feel  in  the  harmonious  co- 
operation of  the  component  parts  of  an  object  towards  one 
end  at  once  ;  it  implies  their  immediate  coexistence  in  the 
mass  they  compose  ;  and  as  that,  immediately  and  at  once, 
can  be  conveyed  to  the  mind  by  the  eye  alone,  Figure  is  the 
legitimate  vehicle  of  Beauty,  and  Design  the  physical  element 
of  Art  "  (p.  4).  Fuselli's  own  art-work  was  wild  and  erratic, 
but  his  art-criticism  shows  insight  as  well  as  knowledge. 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  195 

In  1805,  Richard  Payne  Knight — who  had  discussed  the 
subject     in     previous     works  —  published    An    Analytical 
Enquiry  into  the  Principles  of  Taste,     This   book    is    a 
product  of  the  empirical  school ;  but  it  is  full  of  detached 
wisdom   and   insight.     The  author  maintained   that  under) 
all  the  varieties  of  fashion  and  taste  there  was  a  real  and! 
permanent  principle  of  Beauty,  a  "  standard  of  excellence, 
which   every  generation   of   civilised    man    has   uniformly 
recognised   in  theory "  (p.  4).     Visible  Beauty  he  finds  in  , 
"  harmonious  but  yet  brilliant  and  contrasted  combinations 
of  light,  shade,  and  colour,  blended  but  not  confused,  and  , 
broken    but  not  cast  into  masses"   (Ft.    I.    ch.   v.    §    16,  \ 
p.  68).     His  analysis  of  the  picturesque  in  Art  is  excellent 
(Pt.  II.  ch.  ii.  §§  15-27).     It  does  not  consist  in  reproducing 
"  what  the  eye  sees,"  but  in  massing  objects  so  as  to  give 
them  breadth   of  light  and  shade,  blending  them    lightly 
and  airily. 

An  Enquiry  into  the  state  of  the  Arts  of  Design  in  E?ig- 
land,  etc.,  by  Prince  Hoare  (1806),  need  only  be  mentioned 
as  a  connecting  link  of  a  conventional  character  in  a  some- 
what barren  discussion. 

In  1806,  ten  essays  on  The  Anatomy  and  Philosophy  of 
Expression  as  connected  with  the  Fine  Arts,  by  Sir  Charles 
(then  Mr.)  Bell,  were  published,  though  they  were  written 
some  time  previously.  They  contain  a  "  theory  of  Beauty, 
in  the  (human)  countenance."  Mr.  Bell  held  that  it  was  by 
losing  sight  of  Nature  that  the  right  principle  of  Beauty 
had  not  always  been  reached.  He  objected  to  the  notion 
that  the  artist's  principle  was  in  losing  sight  of  the  real  to 
find  the  ideal ;  as  if,  by  avoiding  the  human,  we  could 
reach  the  Divine.  "With  what  divine  essence,"  he  asks, 
"  is  the  comparison  to  be  made  ? "  The  artist  has  an 
abstract  idea  of  perfection  in  his  mind  ;  and  all  that  the 
ancient  sculptors  did  to  interpret  divinity  was  to  "  avoid 
individuality,"  that  is  to  say,  individual  peculiarity.  He 
was  of  opinion  that  we  can  only  define  Beauty  negatively, 
as  the  reverse  of  the  ugly.  As  Mengs,  the  pupil  of 
Winckelmann  put  it,  "  Labellezza  e  1'opposito  della  brutezza." 
He  held  that  Raphael  was  mistaken  in  supposing  that  as  no 


196  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

real  model  gave  him  perfect  beauty,  he  could  fall  back  on 
the  ideal  within  his  own  mind.  No  painter  could  "  dis- 
engage himself  from  material  things,  and  rise  into  the  sphere 
of  intellectual  ideas."  And  yet,  with  some  inconsistency, 
Bell  affirmed  that  "  the  painter  must  not  be  satisfied  to 
copy  and  represent  what  he  sees  ;  he  must  cultivate  the 
talent  of  imitation  merely  as  giving  scope  to  the  exertions 
of  his  genius."  He  was  a  realist  in  Art-theory,  as  is  seen 
in  his  criticism  alike  of  Winckelmann,  Hogarth,  and  Sir 
Joshua  Reynolds ;  but  his  account  of  "  the  sources  of 
expression "  in  the  human  countenance  is  acute  and  valu- 
able. "  Expression  is  of  more  consequence  than  shape  ;  it 
will  light  up  features  otherwise  heavy ;  it  will  make  us 
forget  all  but  the  quality  of  the  mind"  (Essay  iv.  §  5). 
He  held  that  the  ancient  sculptors  went  beyond  mere  imita- 
tion. They  combined  excellences.  He  differs  from  other 
writers  on  Art  in  his  explanation  of  the  work  of  the  ancients. 
He  says  :  "  They  "  (other  writers)  "  call  the  '  ideal  head ' 
that  which  does  not  represent  individual  beauty,  but  collect- 
ive beauties,  a  selection  and  adaptation  of  beautiful  parts 
taken  from  a  variety  of  individuals,  and  combined  in  one 
representation.  I  place  the  superiority  of  the  antique  on 
higher  ground,  on  the  more  extended  study  of  nature,  of 
brutes  as  well  as  of  man"  (Essay  iv.  §  5). 

In  1 8 10,  Dugald  Stewart — to  whom  we  are  indebted  for 
a  refined  and  scholarly  development  of  the  philosophy  ot 
Thomas  Reid — published  his  Philosophical  Essays  ;  in  the 
second  part  of  which  we  have  "  Essays  relative  to  matters 
of  Taste."  The  first  essay  in  this  second  part  is  On  the 
|  Beautiful.  Stewart  begins  by  saying  that  Beauty  always 
denotes  what  gives  refined  pleasure  ;  and,  criticising  and 
rejecting  the  theory  of  Diderot,  that  it  consists  in  perfection 
of  relations,  he  falls  back  on  the  Socratic  definition  in  the 
Memorabilia,  and  reiterates  what  the  author  of  the  Ana- 
lytical Enquiry?-  and  what  D'Alembert,  in  his  Eclaircisse- 
ments  sur  les  Elemens  de  Philosophic,  had  said  about  the 
metaphysical  meaning  of  words.  He  decides  that  Beauty 
is  primarily  applicable  to  objects  of  sight,  and  that  "  our 
1  See  p.  195. 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  197 

first  ideas"  of  it  are  "derived  from  colours"  (p.  204). 
"  From  the  admiration  of  Colour,  the  eye  gradually  advances 
to  that  of  Forms"  (p.  205);  and  thence  to  Motion,  "a 
species  of  beauty  which  is  in  part  a  modification  of  that  of 
Form  "  (p.  206),  giving  rise  to  Grace  ;  and  the  beauty  of 
graceful  motion  is  due  to  "  the  living  expression  which  it 
exhibits  "  (p.  207).  Stewart  then  criticises  Burke's  theory 
of  the  causes  of  Beauty,  especially  the  doctrine  that 
"smoothness"  is  the  most  considerable  of  them.  It  may 
be,  and  is,  one  element  in  Beauty;  but  the  rough,  the 
jagged,  and  the  angular  may  be  also  beautiful,  as  in 
crystals  and  in  mountain  scenery.  He  deals  also  with  the 
teaching  of  Uvedale  Price,  and  contends  that  "  asperity, 
sharp  angles,  and  irregularity  are  amongst  the  constituents 
of  Beauty."  In  an  eclectic  spirit  he  affirms  that  "the 
meaning  of  the  word  Beauty,  instead  of  being  restricted,  in 
conformity  to  any  particular  system  whatsoever,  should  con- 
tinue to  be  the  generic  word  for  expressing  every  quality 
which,  in  the  works  either  of  Nature  or  Art,  contributes 
to  render  them  agreeable  to  the  eye"  (p.  225). 

Continuing  the  discussion  in  chapters  somewhat  diffuse,  he 
maintains  that  "  amongst  the  elements  which  enter  into  the 
composition  of  the  Beautiful,  some  are  intrinsically  pleasing, 
without  reference  to  anything  else  ;  others  please  only  in  a 
state  of  combination."  "  The  beauty  of  the  former  may  be 
said  to  be  absolute,  or  intrinsic  ;  that  of  the  latter  to  be 
only  relative"  (p.  228).  Things  relatively  beautiful  are  so 
only  in  their  proper  places.  It  is  thus  that  they  are 
picturesque.  Stewart  criticises  Price's  doctrine  of  the 
picturesque  (in  which  it  had  been  arbitrarily  separated  from 
the  Beautiful),  and  falls  back  upon  Gilpin's  view,  in  his 
Observations  on  Picturesque  Beauty,  that  things  are 
picturesque  when  they  are  so  combined,  or  grasped,  as  to 
be  fitted  for  purposes  of  the  painter.  He  objects,  on 
similar  grounds,  to  the  distinction  of  the  Sublime  from  the 
Beautiful,  as  if  it  belonged  to  a  totally  different  category. 
He  would  widen  out  the  general  category,  so  as  to  include 
within  it  the  simply  beautiful,  the  picturesque,  and  the 
sublime.  "  It  is  only  when  the  beautiful  and  the 


198  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

picturesque  are  united  that  a  landscape  painting  produces 
its  highest  effect"  (p.  234).  Many  of  the  details  in  a 
landscape  picture  have  no  intrinsic  beauty,  but  they  suggest 
what  is  not  delineated.  As  Pliny  in  his  Historia  Naturalis 
says  of  Timanthus,  the  painter  of  Iphigenia,  "  in  omnibus 
ejus  operibus,  intelligitur  plus  super  quam  pingetur"  (lib. 
35,  cap.  36). 

In  another  chapter  Stewart  gives  an  acute  criticism  of 
the  principle  of  Association,  as  applied  to  the  Beautiful  by 
Alison.  He  saw  clearly  that  Association  could  never 
account  for  the  origin  of  anything.  "  If  there  was  anything 
originally  and  intrinsically  beautiful,  the  associating  prin- 
ciple would  have  no  materials  on  which  it  could  operate  " 
(p.  242).  It  was  evident  to  him  that  the  office  of  associa- 
tion is  to  heighten  and  combine,  not  to  create.  That  it 
adds  a  charm  to  the  things  round  which  it  gathers,  every 
one  admits. 

Stewart  has  four  essays  "  relative  to  matters  of  Taste." 
The  first,  On  the  Beautiful,  has  been  already  analysed. 
The  second  is  On  the  Sublime,  the  third  On  Taste,  and  the 
fourth  On  the  Culture  of  Habits  connected  with  Taste.  In 
the  second  he  criticises  the  views  of  Uvedale  Price.  A 
feeling  of  the  sublime  is  awakened,  not  by  motion  down- 
wards, according  to  the  law  of  gravitation,  but  by  motion 
upwards  ;  active  power,  like  the  flight  of  the  eagle  soaring 
sunwards,  produces  it.  Similarly,  heroic  qualities  affect  us, 
as  those  which  transcend  ordinary  experience.  He  then 
refers  to  the  influence  of  Religion  in  heightening  the 
sublime,  to  the  forces  of  the  physical  universe,  and  to  the 
power  of  human  emotion.  The  second  essay  is  more 
diffuse  and  popular  than  the  first. 

In  1814,  S.  T.  Coleridge  contributed  several  "Essays 
on  the  Fine  Arts"  to  Felix  Farley's  Bristol  Journal}-  In 
the  first  of  these  essays  "  on  the  principles  of  criticism," 
he  says  of  Association,  "  explaining  everything  it  explains 
nothing,  and  above  all  leaves  itself  unexplained."  In  the 

1  They  were  republished  in  1837,  as  an  "appendix"  to  Joseph 
Cottle's  Early  Recollections  chiefly  relating  to  the  late  Samuel  Taylor 
Coleridge. 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  199 

second  essay  he  refers  to  the  vague  way  in  which  terms 
are  used.  Beauty  gives  pleasure,  but  so  does  food ;  it 
might  be  better  to  speak  of  complacency  or  delight 
than  of  pleasure.  Savage  races  have  no  word  for  Beauty, 
because  the  idea  is  dormant ;  but  though  "  stifled  and 
latent  in  some,  and  perverted  and  demoralised  in  others," 
it  is  a  universal  principle  "  independent  of  local  and  tem- 
porary circumstances,  and  dependent  only  on  the  degree 
in  which  the  faculties  are  developed."  In  the  third  essay 
he  defines  the  Beautiful,  reverting  to  Plotinus.  In  its 
essentials  it  is  "  that  in  which  the  many,  still  seen  as 
many,  become  one."  He  gives  an  illustration  from  the 
frost  ferns  on  a  window-pane.  So  far  is  the  Beautiful  from 
depending  on  association,  it  is  often  "  produced  by  the  mere 
removal  of  associations."  Beauty  is  harmony,  and  exists 
only  in  composition  ;  it  results  from  a  pre  -  established 
harmony  between  Nature  and  Man  ;  and  it  exists  only  in 
objects  appealing  to  the  eye  and  the  ear,  because  these  only 
can  be  divided  into  parts  ;  it  exists  pre-eminently  where  Life 
is  superadded  to  Form,  the  freedom  and  movement  of  life 
in  the  confining  form.  By  this  the  "  forma  informans  " 
reveals  itself.  It  is  thus  that  we  find  a  general  principle  of 
Beauty,  and  while  it  may  be  true  "  de  gustibus  non  est  dis- 
putandum,"  it  is  not  true  "  de  gustu."  Coleridge  therefore 
falls  back  on  Plotinus's  definition  TO  a/xepes  6V,  ev  TroAAois 
(/xxvra^o/zevov.  The  discernment  of  the  harmonious  relation 
of  the  parts  of  a  thing  each  to  each,  and  of  all  of  them  to 
the  whole,  at  once  and  intuitively  excites  in  us  a  feeling  of 
delight.  This  is  wholly  different  from  a  sense  of  what  is 
agreeable,  and  it  is  in  a  sense  intermediate  between  it  and 
a  perception  of  what  is  good.  The  scent  of  the  rose  may 
make  it  more  agreeable  to  us,  but  it  does  not  add  to  its 
beauty.  The  usefulness  of  the  sheep-dog  to  a  shepherd, 
and  its  intelligence,  may  make  it  more  valuable  to  him,  but 
these  things  do  not  increase  its  beauty.  The  Beauty  of  an 
object  depends  neither  upon  its  use,  nor  on  our  seeing  in 
it  the  fitness  of  means  to  ends,  nor  on  proportion.  In  an 
oyster,  the  unshapely  shell  is  the  instrument  of  use ;  the  pearl, 
in  which  beauty  is  found,  is  produced  by  disease.  It  is  not 


2oo  The  Philosophy  of  tJie  Beautiful         CHAP. 

by  analysing  an  object  into  parts  that  its  beauty  is  seen. 
"  The  moment  we  look  at  it  in  division,  the  charm  ceases." 

The  "Essay  on  Beauty"  (1818) — a  fragment  of  two 
pages,  first  printed  in  Coleridge's  Remains,  vol.  i.  —  adds 
nothing  of  importance  to  the  Essays  of  1814.  In  it  he 
refers  the  Beautiful  in  objects  to  two  elements — "  first,  the 
shapely,  formosus ;  second,  the  lively,  the  free,  the  spon- 
taneous." 

In  1817,  Coleridge  wrote  a  Dissertation  on  "  Method," 
as  a  general  introduction  to  the  Encyclopedia  Metropolitana. 
It  has  no  great  value,  amongst  the  schemes  for  classify- 
ing the  sciences  ;  but  it  may  be  referred  to  in  a  passing 
sentence.  Between  the  sciences  (both  pure  and  mixed), 
and  the  scientific  arts,  lie  the  Fine  Arts,  which  are  governed 
by  the  laws  of  taste.  The  Fine  Arts  are  "  sciences  applied 
to  the  purposes  of  pleasure  through  the  medium  of  the 
imagination.  They  are  poetry,  painting,  music,  sculpture, 
architecture."  In  reference  to  the  mixed  sciences,  and  some 
of  the  applied  sciences,  the  "  mental  initiative  comes  from 
without."  In  the  Fine  Arts,  the  mental  initiative  must 
necessarily  proceed  from  within.  Their  authors  are  impelled 
by  a  mighty  inward  power,  a  feeling  quod  nequeo  monstrare, 
et  sentio  tan  turn. 

7.  David  Wilkie  to  Sir  William  Hamilton 

In  1816,  Henry  H.  Milman  —  afterwards  the  dis- 
tinguished historian  of  Latin  Christianity — obtained  the 
prize  for  an  English  essay  at  Oxford,  on  a  comparative 
estimate  of  Sculpture  and  Painting.  It  is  published  in  the 
third  volume  of  The  Oxford  English  Prize  Essays  (1830). 
He  refers  to  the  difficulty  of  framing  any  positive  theory  as 
to  Taste.  The  Fine  Arts,  while  they  advance  the  imagina- 
tion through  the  sense  of  sight,  and  strictly  imitative  in  their 
origin,  "become  purely  ideal,  and  present  us  with  forms 
closely  adhering  to  their  types  in  Nature,  but  wrought  to 
supernatural  grandeur  or  beauty."  It  is  this  address  to  the 
imagination  which  chiefly  causes  the  emotions  within  us. 
Painting  has  a  wider  scope  than  sculpture.  There  is  in 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  201 

man  an  innate  tendency  toward  the  ideal.  "  All  from 
Thersites  up  to  an  Achilles,  between  a  *  Hecate  and  a  Helen,' 
may  exist  in  nature,  and  why  not  something  more  lofty  than 
Achilles,  more  lovely  than  Helen  ?  " 

The  dicta  of  a  Scottish  artist  of  some  repute,  David 
Wilkie,  on  the  subject  of  Beauty,  should  not  be  overlooked, 
for  the  following  reason.  Wilkie  began  his  artistic  life  as 
a  literalist,  and  imitator  of  Nature,  but  he  ended  as  an 
idealist,  at  least  to  some  extent.  In  the  year  1805,  at  the 
age  of  nineteen,  he  wrote  :  "  I  am  convinced  that  no  picture 
can  possess  real  merit,  unless  it  is  a  just  representation  of 
Nature."1  In  the  year  1836,  at  the  age  of  fifty-one,  he 
wrote  :  "  If  Art  was  an  exact  representation  of  Nature,  it 
could  be  practised  with  absolute  certainty,  and  assurance  of 
success  ;  but  the  duty  of  Art  is  of  a  higher  kind.  .  .  .  Art 
is  only  Art  when  it  adds  mind  to  form."  2 

There  is  a  discourse  on  '  Beauty '  in  John  Flaxman's 
Lectures  on  Sculpture  (1829),  from  which  one  sentence  may 
be  quoted  : — "  That  Beauty  is  not  merely  an  imaginary 
quality,  but  a  real  essence,  may  be  inferred  from  the 
harmony  of  the  Universe." 

At  this  date,  too,  a  sentence  from  Constable  (1776- 
*837) — the  pioneer  of  Turner,  and  of  all  our  modern  land- 
scape Art — may  be  quoted  : — "  I  know  that  the  execution 
of  my  paintings  is  singular,  but  I  love  that  rule  of  Sterne's  : 
'  Never  mind  the  dogmas  of  the  schools  ;  go  straight  to 
the  heart,  if  you  have  it  in  you.'  People  may  say  what 
they  like  of  my  art.  I  say  that  it  is  my  own." 

In  1817,  Sir  George  Stewart  Mackenzie  published  an 
Essay  on  some  subjects  connected  with  Taste.  He  begins 
by  desiring  a  more  accurate  definition  of  the  terms  Beautiful 
and  Sublime.  He  criticises  Dugald  Stewart's  notion  that 
the  term  Beauty  was  originally  applied  to  colour,  and  then 
extended  to  other  things  agreeable  to  the  senses.  Though 
he  admits,  with  Stewart,  that  Beauty  is  nothing  sui  generis, 
he  recognises  "  an  internal  faculty  which  judges  and  deter- 

1  Life  of  Sir  David  Wilkie,  by  Allan  Cunningham,  vol.  i.  p.  76  ; 
cf.  p.  158. 

2  Ibid.  vol.  iii.  p.  131. 


202  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

mines  which  perceptions  are  true  of  beauty,  and  which  of 
ugliness'5  (p.  20).  He  thinks  that  Beauty  does  not  reside 
in  the  objects  of  Nature  or  their  qualities,  but  in  the  effects 
they  produce  (p.  28).  Beauty  is  "the  sign  by  which  we 
express  the  consciousness  of  pleasurable  effects  following 
the  perception  of  certain  qualities  in  objects "  (p.  39). 
He  thinks  that  in  all  discussions  of  the  emotions,  we  should 
keep  strictly  to  their  "  genuine  effects,  Pleasure  and  Pain  " 
(p.  40).  Then  follows  a  criticism  of  the  association  theory 
as  applied  ( I )  to  Form,  (2)  to  Colour,  and  (3)  to  Sound.  The 
radical  defect  of  Alison's  theory  is  pointed  out  with  much 
acuteness.  There  is  "  something  in  our  minds  which  leads 
us  to  prefer  certain  forms,  etc.,  to  others"  (p.  161).  He 
accounts  for  varieties  of  taste  by  variations  in  the  faculties 
and  their  balance,  and  by  differences  and  defects  in  the 
brain  (p.  298). 

An  essay  "  On  Taste "  by  William  Hazlitt,  first  pub- 
lished in  1819,  was  included  in  the  volume  of  Sketches  and 
Essays,  collected  by  his  son,  and  issued  in  1839.  This 
essay  of  Hazlitt  is,  for  the  most  part,  a  diluted  commentary 
on  the  old  de gustibus  maxim,  although  he  admits  a  general 
approach  to  canons  of  taste  amongst  the  educated.  Taste 
should  not  be  opposed  to  genius,  for  genius  in  art  is  simply 
the  power  of  producing  the  Beautiful,  and  men  of  genius 
should  be  the  best  judges  of  excellence.  "  He  sees  most  of 
Nature  who  understands  its  language  best,  or  connects  one 
thing  with  the  greatest  number  of  other  things.  Experience 
is  the  key  which  unfolds  a  thousand  imperceptible  distinc- 
tions." The  triumph  of  art  is  shown,  "not  in  making  the  eye 
a  microscope,  but  in  making  it  the  interpreter  and  organ 
of  all  that  can  touch  the  soul."  "  Beauty  does  not  consist 
in  a  medium,  but  in  gradation  and  harmony."  He  saw  the 
defect  of  the  association  theory  :  "  If  there  is  a  pleasing  asso- 
ciation, there  must  be  first  something  naturally  pleasing." 
"  Beauty  consists  in  gradation  of  colours,  or  symmetry  of 
form  :  sublimity  arises  from  the  source  of  power,  and  is 
aided  by  contrast.  The  ludicrous  is  the  incoherent,  arising 
from  weakness."  "  The  ideal  is  not  confined  to  creation,  but 
takes  place  in  imitation.  Invention  is  only  feigning  accord- 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  203 

ing  to  nature.  .  .  .  Rules  and  models  destroy  genius  and 
art ;  and  the  excess  of  the  artificial  in  the  end  cures  itself. 
.  .  .  Nature  contains  an  infinite  variety  of  parts,  relations, 
and  significations  ;  and  different  artists  take  them,  and  all 
together  do  not  give  the  whole.  ...  It  is  ridiculous  to 
suppose  there  is  but  one  standard  or  one  style." 

William  Hazlitt  also  wrote  an  "  Essay  on  the  Fine 
Arts  "  for  the  sixth  edition  of  the  Encyclopedia  Britannica, 
which  was  republished  in  1836,  in  the  second  volume 
of  his  Literary  Remains.  It  is  a  defence  of  the  imitative 
theory  of  art.  He  thinks  that  the  form  of  the  Greek  statues 
was  "  as  completely  local  and  national  as  the  figures  on  a 
Chinese  screen."  Their  superior  symmetry  was  all  due 
(i)  to  "the  superior  symmetry  of  the  models  in  nature," 
and  (2)  to  the  "more  constant  opportunities  for  studying 
them,"  with  the  peculiar  susceptibility  of  the  Greek  race  to 
what  is  beautiful  and  grand.  The  beauty  of  the  statues 
"  existed  substantially  in  the  forms  from  which  they  were 
copied";  and  in  keeping  with  this  he  defines  the  ideal  as 
simply  the  preference  of  that  which  is  fine  in  Nature  to  that 
which  is  less  so.  He  maintains  that  the  figures  in  Raphael's 
cartoons,  and  his  groups  in  the  Vatican,  the  work  of  Da 
Vinci  and  Correggio,  and  every  great  master  in  Art,  are 
all  careful  copies  from  Nature.  His  essay  is  an  elaborate 
attempt  to  prove  this  thesis.  Success  in  Art  is  a  return  to 
Nature,  and  a  reaction  against  all  attempts  to  improve 
upon  it. 

It  is  easy  to  criticise  such  a  representation  of  the  ideal 
theory  in  Art,  as  Reynolds  has  laid  down  in  his  Discourse, 
"giving  the  general  ideas,  and  avoiding  details."  But 
Hazlitt  utterly  fails  to  understand  Sir  Joshua,  and  was  unable 
to  grasp  the  profound  truth  which  underlay  his  maxim  ; 
and  yet,  had  he  carried  out  the  principle  underlying  one  of 
his  own  sentences  towards  the  close  of  his  essay,  he  might 
have  left  the  most  of  it  unwritten.  "  We  still  want  a 
Prometheus  (in  Art)  to  embody  the  inmost  refinements  of 
thought  to  the  outward  eye,  to  lay  bare  the  very  soul  of 
passion.  That  picture  is  of  comparatively  little  value, 
which  can  be  translated  into  another  language  ;  ...  for  it 


204  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

is  the  excellence  of  every  Art  to  give  what  can  be  given  by 
no  other  in  the  same  degree"  (Literary  Remains,  vol.  ii. 
pp.  177,  178). 

In  discussing  "  the  immediate  emotions  "  in  his  Lectures 
on  the  Philosophy  of  the  Human  Mind,  published  in  1828, 
Dr.  Thomas  Brown — who  held  the  Chair  of  Moral  Philo- 
sophy in  Edinburgh  from  1810  to  1820 — deals  with  the 
subject  of  Beauty  and  Sublimity  (Lectures  53-58).  It  is  an 
obscure  and  wordy  discussion.  His  first  remark  is  that 
Pleasure  is  "  the  one  essential "  of  the  emotions  ;  and  his 
second  that  we  transfer  the  delight  we  feel,  and  embody  it 
in  the  object.  "  Beauty  is  simply  that  which  excites  in  us 
a  delightful  feeling."  The  external  beauty  is  our  delight 
reflected  over  the  object,  and  diffused  into  it.  He  quotes 
Akenside's  lines — 

Mind,  mind  alone,  bear  witness  Heaven  and  earth, 
The  living  fountain  in  itself  contains 
Of  beauteous  and  sublime 

— and  spends  many  pages  in  trying  to  prove  that  the  whole 
charm  of  external  Nature  consists  in  its  reflecting  our  own 
feelings.  Many  things  modify  our  emotion  of  Beauty.  It 
is  flexible  under  the  influence  of  fashion,  or  even  of  acci- 
dent and  passion.  He  thinks  this  is  true  both  of  the  beauty 
of  external  Nature,  and  of  Moral  Beauty.  These  modifying 
tendencies  are  at  work  from  our  birth,  and  deflect  our 
judgments.  We  can  only  reach  a  probability,  and  not  a 
certainty  as  to  whether  there  is  such  a  thing  as  original 
Beauty.  He  goes  on,  however,  to  refer  to  the  "natural 
language  of  emotion,"  which  is  "  instinctively  understood," 
and  says  that  the  burden  of  proof  rests  with  those  who  deny 
an  original  Beauty  independent  of  association,  and  seems 
at  least  to  hint  that  an  original  standard  of  Beauty  is  as  likely 
as  the  existence  of  an  original  standard  of  Truth.  Neverthe- 
less he  endorses  the  association  theory  almost  in  full ;  and 
affirms  that  Beauty  is  not  anything  "  which  exists  in  objects, 
independently  of  the  mind  that  perceives  them,"  and  that 
the  emotion  of  the  beautiful  is  "  not  one  feeling  of  the  mind, 
but  many  feelings  that  have  a  certain  similarity."  The 


xii  The  PJiilosophy  of  Britain  205 

Beautiful  is  "  a  mere  general  term  expressive  of  similarity 
in  various  pleasing  feelings." 

John  Wilson  (Christopher  North),  Brown's  successor  in 
the  Chair  of  Moral  Philosophy  in  Edinburgh  (1820-1853), 
in  the  main  followed  Alison  and  Jeffrey  in  their  association 
theory,  as  did  the  late  Professor  MacDougall,  Wilson's  suc- 
cessor in  office  from  1 85 3  to  1868.  Wilson  wrote  an  article  in 
BlackwoocFs  Magazine  (January  1839),  in  which  he  speaks 
of  the  theory — "  that  all  beauty  and  sublimity  in  external 
Nature  are  but  the  reflections  of  mental  qualities" — as  "in 
a  great  measure  true  " ;  but  the  real  attraction  of  the  theory 
to  WTilson  (as  to  all  poetic  minds)  lay  in  its  recognition  of 
"  analogies  between  the  object  of  the  external  world,  and  the 
attributes  of  our  moral  and  intellectual  being."  He  saw 
through  the;fiction  that  it  was  the  process  of  association  that 
made  objects  beautiful  to  us.  We  as  instantaneously 
perceive  Beauty,  as  we  perceive  the  object  itself.  But  it 
was  that  part  of  the  theory  of  association  which  discerned 
mental  qualities  in  Nature  that  appealed  to  Wilson.  While 
"  admitting  the  truth  of  the  principle  "  of  Alison,  he  sought 
to  "  limit  the  application  of  it." 

A  short  section  in  James  Mill's  Analysis  of  the  Pheno- 
mena of  the  Human  Mind  (1829) — chap.  xxix.  §2 — deals 
with  the  "objects  called  sublime  and  beautiful,  and  their 
contraries,  contemplated  as  causes  of  our  pleasures  and 
pains."  Mill  adopted  Alison's  view  almost  entirely,  and 
added  nothing  of  importance  to  it. 

A  course  of  Lectures  on  Painting  was  delivered  at  the 
Royal  Academy  of  Fine  Arts,  London,  in  1834,  by  Henry 
Howard,  R.A.,  Professor  of  Painting  to  the  Academy. 
They  were  published  in  1848.  They  deal  with  design, 
chiaroscuro,  colour,  composition,  etc.  In  the  lecture  on 
Design,  the  theory  of  the  Beautiful  is  dealt  with.  The 
author  applies  the  maxim  "  the  proper  study  of  mankind  is 
man  "  to  Art,  and  to  any  answer  we  may  give  to  the  question, 
"  How  to  look  on  Nature."  The  Greeks  saw  that  we  must 
refine  upon  ordinary  Nature,  and  therefore  not  select  any 
specimen  for  portrayal,  but — from  what  he  calls  "a  wide 
and  collective  survey  " — find  the  centre  or  generic  character 


206  The  Pliilosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

of  all  the  species  we  meet  with.  The  Greeks  even  idealised 
their  ideal  man,  to  find  the  divine  ;  and  they  brought  in  the 
ideal,  that  in  the  human  they  might  find  an  emblem  of  the 
divine.  All  Greek  sculptors  and  painters  of  eminence — 
Phidias,  Polycletus,  Praxiteles,  Zeuxis  —  present  in  their 
masterpieces  the  combined  result  of  many  actual  forms  of 
beauty,  blending  their  separate  excellences  in  one.  The 
notion  that  nothing  is  natural  but  that  which  is  "  drawn 
from  an  individual  type  "  (p.  67),  is  condemned  as  a  "  vulgar 
error."  The  perfections  of  Art  are  "deviations  from 
Nature."  So  far  art  must  be  conventional.  Artistic  style 
is  "  Nature  rectified  by  her  own  permanent  standard,  and 
restored  to  her. original  perfection"  (p.  68).  Mr.  Howard 
does  not  enter  into  the  metaphysics  of  the  problem,  but, 
dealing  with  the  beauty  of  form,  he  maintains  that  certain 
forms  are  beautiful  intrinsically,  apart  from  association  ;  and, 
referring  to  the  theories  which  find  the  essence  of  Beauty 
in  "  fitness,  propriety,  harmony,  perfection,"  he  says  that 
they  all  virtually  "  admit  proportion  to  be  an  essential 
element  of  Beauty"  (p.  71),  which  he  thinks  a  "primary 
and  universal"  element  (p.  72). 

The  contribution  of  Sir  William  Hamilton  to  the 
philosophy  of  ^Esthetic,  in  his  Lectures  and  the  Notes  to  his 
edition  of  Reid,  is  fragmentary  ;  but  the  forty-sixth  or  last 
lecture  of  his  metaphysical  course  is  devoted  to  the  Beautiful 
and  the  Sublime.  His  treatment  is  wholly  subjective. 
He  makes  no  attempt  to  determine  the  objective  character 
of  Beauty  itself.  After  discussing  the  feelings,  and  sub- 
dividing them — in  a  somewhat  artificial  manner — he  con- 
siders those  "  which  arise  from  the  acts  of  the  Imagination 
and  the  Understanding  in  conjunction"  (p.  506).  These, 
he  says,  are  "  principally  those  of  Beauty  and  Sublimity." 
He,  however,  distinguishes  aptly  (because  the  distinction  is 
constantly  forgotten)  between  the  feelings  of  Beauty  and 
the  judgments  of  Taste.  He  affirms  that  the  satisfaction 
which  we  feel  in  the  presence  of  the  Beautiful  or  the 
Sublime  "  arises  solely  from  the  consideration  of  the 
object,  and  altogether  apart  from  any  desire  of,  or  satis- 
faction in  its  possession"  (p.  507).  He  refers  to  the 


xii  The  PhilosopJiy  of  Britain  207 

distinction  between  Beauty  that  is  "free  or  absolute,"  and 
Beauty  that  is  "  dependent  or  relative."  He  rejects  the 
distinction,  but  at  the  same  time  affirms  that  certain  objects 
"  please  us  directly,  and  of  themselves,  no  reference  being- 
had  to  aught  beyond  the  form  which  they  exhibit" 
(p.  508).  Others  which  please  us  indirectly,  and  for  a 
purpose,  are  simply  useful ;  although  the  same  object  may 
please  us  in  both  ways.  Relative  beauty  is  only  "a 
beautified  utility,  or  a  utilised  beauty"  (p.  509).  In  the 
case  of  Free  or  Absolute  Beauty,  both  the  imagination 
and  understanding  find  occupation,  and  an  object  is  beautiful 
to  us  in  proportion  as  these  two  energies  act  fully  and 
freely.  The  action  of  the  understanding,  however,  tends 
towards  unity.  It  binds  up  separate  parts  into  a  whole  ; 
and  as  different  minds  do  this  differently — with  varying 
speed,  and  varying  success  —  we  can  easily  account  for 
differences  in  the  apprehension  of  the  Beautiful.  The 
less  cultivated  mind  lingers  over  the  parts,  the  multifarious 
details  ;  the  more  educated  combines  these  in  unity.  So 
much  for  the  feeling  of  the  beautiful.  A  judgment  of  Taste 
is  either  pure  or  mixed  ;  it  is  pure  when  it  is  based  on  the 
beautiful  solely,  it  is  mixed  when  it  takes  account  of  other 
things  which  stimulate  the  senses.  Thus,  Hamilton's  defini- 
tion of  the  beautiful  is,  "A  beautiful  thing  is  one  whose 
form  occupies  the  Imagination  and  Understanding  in  a  free, 
and  full,  and  consequently  an  agreeable  activity  "  (p.  5 1 2). 
It  will  be  seen  that  it  is  defined,  not  from  what  it  is  in  itself, 
but  solely  from  its  effects. 

He  proceeds  to  a  definition  of  the  Sublime  in  the  same 
fashion.  "  The  beautiful  attracts  without  repelling  ;  whereas 
the  sublime  at  once  does  both  :  the  beautiful  affords  us  a 
feeling  of  unmingled  pleasure,  in  the  full  and  unimpeded 
activity  of  our  cognitive  powers ;  whereas  our  feeling  of 
sublimity  is  a  mingled  one  of  pleasure  and  pain — of  pleasure 
in  the  consciousness  of  the  strong  energy,  of  pain  in  the  con- 
sciousness that  this  energy  is  in  vain.  But,  as  the  amount 
of  pleasure  in  the  sublime  is  greater  than  the  amount  of 
pain,  it  follows  that  the  free  energy  it  elicits  must  be  greater 
than  the  free  energy  it  repels.  For  Beauty,  magnitude  is  an 


208  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

impediment ;  sublimity,  on  the  contrary,  requires  magnitude 
as  its  condition.  That  we  are  at  once  attracted  and 
repelled  by  sublimity,  arises  from  the  circumstance  that 
the  object  which  we  call  sublime  is  proportioned  to  one  of 
our  faculties,  and  disproportioned  to  another"  (p.  513). 
He  divides  the  sublime  into  three  classes — the  sublime  of 
Space,  of  Time,  and  of  Power.  The  Picturesque  stands 
opposite  both  to  the  Beautiful  and  the  Sublime.  An  object 
is  ugly  when  the  understanding  and  imagination,  working 
together,  cannot  take  it  up  into  a  unity.  But  without 
wholly  failing,  the  faculties  may  be  only  embarrassed,  em- 
barrassed by  the  amount  of  variety,  which  for  a  time  baffles 
the  reduction  of  the  mass  to  detail,  to  unity.  Hamilton 
thinks  that  if  the  mind  "expatiates  freely  and  easily  in 
variety,  without  attempting  painfully  to  reduce  it  to  unity  " 
(p.  567),  it  will  find  the  object  before  it  picturesque.  A 
picturesque  object  is  "  so  determinately  varied,  and  so 
abrupt  in  its  variety,  it  presents  so  complete  a  negation  of 
all  rounded  contour,  and  so  regular  an  irregularity  of  broken 
lines  and  angles,  that  every  attempt  at  reducing  it  to  a 
harmonious  whole  is  found  to  be  impossible  "  (p.  5 1 7). 

There  is  much  that  is  suggestive  and  valuable  in 
Hamilton's  discussion,  but  as  a  branch  of  psychology  it  is 
altogether  subjective.  He  does  not  face  the  problem  of  the 
nature  of  objective  beauty. 

8.  M( ''Vicar  to  George  Ramsay 

By  far  the  most  important  Scottish  writer  on  the  philo- 
sophy of  the  Beautiful  during  the  nineteenth  century  has 
been  Dr.  M'Vicar  of  Moffat.  In  the  year  1837  he  issued 
a  work  On  the  Beautiful,  the  Picturesque,  and  the  Sublime. 
Nineteen  years  afterwards  he  published  a  series  of  Lectures 
addressed  to  the  Philosophical  Institution  of  Edinburgh,  on 
the  same  subject,  and  memorable  lectures  they  were. 
Delivered  in  the  city  of  Jeffrey,  they  gave  the  coup  de  grace 
to  the  association  doctrine,  so  that  it  could  no  longer  be 
described  as  the  "  Edinburgh  theory  "  on  the  subject.  But 
M 'Vicar's  earlier  work  is  the  more  thoroughgoing  and 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  209 

philosophical  of  the  two.  It  is  full  of  wisdom,  and  contains 
much  relevant  criticism,  both  of  the  transcendentalists  and 
of  the  disciples  of  experience.  Its  division  into  four  parts — 
in  which  Beauty,  physical,  physiological,  and  ethical,  are 
considered  seriatim — is,  however,  an  unfortunate  one. 

M'Vicar  saw  clearly  that  if  "Beauty"  and  "Ugliness" 
were  matters  of  taste,  "Truth"  and  "Error"  must  be 
matters  of  opinion,  or  "  ways  of  viewing  things " ;  while 
"  Good  "  and  "  Evil  "  would  be  accidents  of  custom  ;  and 
that,  therefore,  the  problems  of  the  philosophy  of  the  Beau- 
tiful "touch  the  first  principle  of  all  Philosophy"  (p.  n). 
He  also  saw  that,  if  we  are  to  succeed  in  finding  out 
"  wherein  true  Beauty  lies,"  we  must  withdraw  it  from  the 
sphere  of  sense,  and  "  fix  it  amongst  the  permanencies  of  our 
intellectual  nature"  (p.  n).  The  emotion  of  the  Beauti- 
ful, instead  of  being  confined  to  the  imagination,  "  has  the 
range  of  the  whole  mind"  (p.  19).  It  is  also  "extremely 
varied  as  to  its  origin"  (p.  20).  It  "tends  to  diffuse  itself 
over  the  objects  which  awake  it "  (p.  21);  and  so  mankind 
has  come  to  believe  that  "  Nature  is  really  full  of  feeling, 
and  animated  either  by  one  Great  Spirit,  whose  expression 
in  every  region  is  always  kindred  with  the  scene,  or  by 
many  spirits,  each  of  which  has  its  own  peculiar  dwelling- 
place"  (pp.  21,  22).  The  various  objects  in  Nature  that 
are  beautiful,  he  regards  as  so  many  "natural  mirrors  that 
only  reflect,  and  do  not  utter  feeling  "  ;  and  he  goes  on  to 
unfold  what  he  calls  "the  law  of  imputation"  (p.  22),  by 
which  we  externalise  our  feelings.  Probably  the  law  of 
investiture  would  have  been  a  happier  phrase. 

In  the  next  chapter  M'Vicar  classifies  the  various  sorts 
of  Beauty,  in  two  interesting  tables,  in  the  former  of 
which  he  divides  it  into  Beauty  derived  from  fitness,  utility 
imitation,  reminiscence,  and  association,  and  as  therefore 
objective  ;  and  Beauty  that  is  factitious  and  subjective,  due 
to  organic  and  even  irrational  causes.  In  the  latter  table 
he  divides  it  into  (i)  simple  Beauty,  the  beauty  of  Repose, 
which  "  awakens  disinterested  admiration";  and  (2)  express- 
ive Beauty,  the  beauty  of  association.  The  former  he 
subdivides  into  Beauty,  kaleidoscopic  and  arabesque  ;  and 


210  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

the  latter  into  Beauty,  picturesque  and  sublime.  His  his- 
torical and  critical  remarks  on  the  theories  of  Alison  and 
Jeffrey  at  this  point  are  excellent. 

In  his  analysis  of  beautiful  objects  M 'Vicar  distinguishes 
the  way  in  which  their  constituent  parts  are  grouped  to- 
gether from  the  elements  out  of  which  they  are  composed. 
It  depends  on  the  latter,  or  the  way  in  which  objects  are 
composed,  whether  they  are  simply  beautiful,  or  picturesque, 
or  sublime  ;  and  he  thinks  that  "  smoothness  with  regard  to 
surface,  and  simplicity  of  ratio  with  regard  to  structure,  are 
the  principles  by  which  Beauty  is  developed"  (p.  50). 
This  is  just  the  unity  in  variety  of  the  ancients,  and  of 
some  modern  writers.  It  is  the  principle  of  simple  in- 
expressive Beauty  only  that  leaves  the  emotions  in  a  state  of 
repose.  But,  he  asks,  are  not  wreck  and  ruin  expressive, 
when  these  things  have  been  "  set  free  from  their  artificial 
symmetry"?  (p.  56).  While  conformity  to  symmetry  im- 
parts simple  Beauty,  departures  from  it  give  expression  ; 
and  "  as  objects  lose  mere  beauty,  they  acquire  expression, 
and  from  having  been  simply  beautiful,  they  become  pictur- 
esque or  sublime"  (p.  57).  Kaleidoscopic  beauty,  however 
perfect,  is,  "  after  all,  hard  and  stern-looking,  and  it  seals 
rather  than  opens  the  fountains  of  emotion  "  (p.  58).  "  The 
most  regularly  beautiful  countenances  are  usually  the  most 
inexpressive."  Expression  always  breaks  away  from  formal 
symmetry.  As  the  one  increases,  the  other  diminishes 
(p.  69).  So,  in  landscape,  the  Dutch  is  symmetrical,  but 
there  is  no  expression  in  it ;  or  (as  in  Claude  Lorrain) 
we  have  "sunny  serenity  and  sweet  repose"  (p.  73): 
whereas  in  Salvator  Rosa  we  have  compositions  that 
are  wild,  and  full  of  feeling.  The  same  is  true  of  musical 
compositions. 

In  other  chapters  M' Vicar  develops  his  principles  of 
Beauty  as  depending  either  on  angles  or  areas  (kaleido- 
scopic beauty),  or  on  lines  and  contours  (arabesque  beauty)  ; 
and  then,  in  what  he  calls  his  "  philosophical  section " 
(pp.  131-181),  he  discusses  the  relation  which  exists  (i) 
between  the  beauty  and  the  economy  of  Nature ;  (2)  be- 
tween the  beautiful,  picturesque,  and  sublime,  and  our 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  211 

mental  economy  ;  and  (3)  between  the  Beautiful  and  our 
organisation. 

He  asks,  why  is  the  symmetry  of  objects  a  source  of 
Beauty  ?  and  why  is  the  expression  of  objects  increased, 
when  their  mere  symmetry  is  destroyed  ?  He  answers 
that  symmetry  is  the  condition  of  perfection  in  organic 
bodies.  Nature  is  everywhere  endeavouring  to  realise 
equilibrium,  in  symmetrical  and  stable  products.  It  is  so 
from  the  structure  of  the  solar  system,  down  to  that  of 
the  flower.  Thus  simple  Beauty  has  its  signature  in  Nature  ; 
it  is  not  a  creation  of  the  mind.  Here  he  states,  how- 
ever, a  very  disputable  proposition,  viz.  that  it  is  the  func- 
tion of  physical  agencies  to  produce  symmetry,  but  of 
the  vital  agencies  to  produce  departures  from  it,  because 
they  impart  movement.  They  expand  and  vary,  while  the 
former  condense  and  confine.  But  surely  such  a  vital 
process  as  the  growth  of  a  rose  is  more  symmetrical  than 
such  a  physical  agency  as  the  rush  of  a  cataract,  while  the 
latter  may  be  far  fuller  of  expression  ?  M 'Vicar  is  clearly 
wrong  in  confining  simple  Beauty  to  the  physical  economy 
of  Nature,  and  expressive  Beauty  to  its  vital  economy. 

In  his  chapter  on  the  relation  between  the  Beautiful  and 
our  mental  economy,  he  raises  the  question,  how  it  comes 
about  that  Nature  often  charms  us,  in  spite  of  our  knowing 
nothing  as  to  what  it  is.  He  rejects  the  solution  of  habit 
(or  use  and  wont),  because  habit  often  operates  precisely  the 
other  way,  unfitting  us  for  the  enjoyment  of  the  Beautiful 
in  Nature.  On  the  other  hand,  we  constantly  appreciate  a 
new  thing  that  is  beautiful  the  moment  we  see  it.  Going 
straight  to  the  fountain-head,  he  finds  that  Beauty  lies  in 
the  unity  and  variety  of  Nature  ;  our  analysis  showing  the 
variety,  and  our  synthesis  disclosing  the  unity.  We  see  a 
"  harmonious  variety  running  into  a  central  unity,  and  the 
central  unity  radiating  into  a  harmonious  variety"  (p.  152). 
That  is  the  symmetry  of  Nature. 

He  next  asks  how  it  is  that  objects  which  are  not  sym- 
metrical become  expressive  ;  and  he  answers  :  "  Their  char- 
acter is  either  that  of  a  variety  which  refuses  to  recognise 
a  preceding  principle  of  unity,  or  that  of  a  unity  which 


212  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

refuses  to  expand  into  a  harmonious  variety"  (p.  157).  But 
how  does  all  this  develop  emotion  ?  It  is  partly  because  the 
demand  for  unity  in  variety  is  unsatisfied.  The  mind  moves 
on  from  point  to  point,  from  centre  to  centre,  and  is  not  at 
rest ;  and  this  gives  rise  to  the  idea  of  many  separate 
powers  in  Nature,  centres  of  force  and  energy,  i.e.  to  a  poly- 
theistic interpretation  of  Nature.  So  much  for  the  cases  in 
which  the  mind  is  resisted,  but  not  overcome. 

But  now  suppose  that  the  object  is  a  unity  which  defies 
expansion  into  variety  (e.g.  the  boundlessness  of  space,  or 
of  the  Infinite),  then,  while  the  mind  is  unable  to  take  in 
the  idea  as  a  whole,  or  to  get  round  it  by  imagination,  the 
judgment,  and  the  correlative  feeling,  are  those  of  the 
sublime ;  and  this  connects  itself  with  the  monotheistic 
interpretation  of  Nature.  M 'Vicar  acutely  points  out  that 
the  judgment  and  the  feeling  of  the  merely  picturesque  in 
Nature  tends  to  a  polytheistic  view  of  the  universe,  while  that 
of  the  sublime  tends  to  a  monotheistic  one  (pp.  160,  161). 

In  a  subsequent  chapter,  on  the  relation  of  the  Beautiful 
to  our  organisation,  he  shows  the  influence  of  the  physique 
over  our  judgments  and  feelings  as  to  the  Beautiful.  He 
finds  a  partial  explanation  of  the  curve  (or  Hogarth's  "line 
of  Beauty")  in  the  form  of  the  spinal  cord,  which  is  "the 
axis  of  the  organic  system"  (p.  172),  and  in  the  elliptic 
curves  of  the  brain.  "  The  architecture  of  the  mind's 
palace,"  he  says,  "  exhibits  the  lines  of  Beauty  on  all  hands  " 

(P-  175)- 

M 'Vicar's  book  has  not  received  the  attention  it  deserves, 
either  in  Britain,  on  the  Continent,  or  in  America. 

In  1842,  Sir  Thomas  Dick  Lauder  prefixed  an  Essay  on 
the  Origin  of  Taste  to  an  edition  of  Sir  Uvedale  Price's 
Essay  on  the  Picturesque,  and  some  others  of  his  essays. 
He  defines  his  aim  as  an  attempt  to  get  beyond  the  more 
popular  views  of  Price  as  to  the  objects,  or  combination  of 
objects,  which  excite  in  us  an  emotion  of  the  beautiful,  to 
the  philosophical  ground  on  which  the  principle  of  Beauty 
may  be  maintained  ;  but  it  is  in  the  style  of  the  doctrinaire 
that  Lauder  sets  forth  "  the  true  theory,"  and  denounces  the 
"  great  error  "  that  "  there  exist  in  material  objects  certain 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  213 

inherent  and  invariable  qualities  of  beauty,  sublimity,  and 
picttiresqueness  "  (p.  2).  If  it  were  so,  he  thinks  all  tastes 
would  agree ;  and  so  he  falls  back  helplessly  on  the 
association  theory  of  Alison,  Jeffrey,  etc. ;  and  his  long 
essay  is  merely  a  restatement  of  that  theory  without  critical 
insight.  He  even  quotes  Robert  Burns  as  a  sudden  convert 
to  Alison's  theory  on  a  perusal  of  his  Essay,  not  perceiving 
the  delicate  irony  that  underlay  the  Scottish  bard's  letter  to 
the  Edinburgh  essayist. 

In  1846,  Mr.  D.  R.  Hay  of  Edinburgh  published  his 
First  Principles  of  Symmetrical  Beauty.  This,  with  his 
Science  of  Beauty,  as  developed  in  Nature,  and  applied  in  Art, 
though  not  the  earliest,  was  the  most  important  of  numerous 
works  by  Mr.  Hay  on  the  science  of  the  Beautiful.1  In  it  he 
tries,  as  he  says,  to  develop  the  principles  of  Symmetrical 
Beauty,  and  their  application  to  the  Arts,  in  a  popular 
manner.  Mr.  Hay  knew  nothing  of  Plato  when  he  began 
his  studies,  but  he  worked  on  the  Platonic  lines.  He  believed, 
as  Sir  Isaac  Newton  did,  in  "  general  laws  with  respect  to 
all  the  senses,"  and  therefore  that  there  was  an  underlying 
analogy  between  the  principles  of  form  and  those  of  sound. 
He  laboured  very  much,  as  Michael  Angelo  did,  with 
a  view  to  discover  the  principles  of  Beauty.  Of  ^Esthetics 
he  says  :  "In  this  science  the  human  mind  is  the  subject, 
and  external  Nature  the  object.  Each  individual  mind  is  a 

1  The  following  are  some  of  Mr.  Hay's  other  works  : — 

The  Laws  of  Harmonious  Colouring,  to  -which  is  added  an  attempt 
to  define  ^Esthetical  Taste  (1828). 

The  Natural  Principles  and  Analogy  of  the  Harmony  of  Form. 
(1842). 

Proportion,  or  the  geometric  principle  of  Beauty  analysed  (1843). 

An  Essay  on  Ornamental  Design  (1844). 

Principles  of  Beauty  in  Colouring  systematised  (1845). 

On  the  Science  of  those  Proportions  by  -which  the  human  head  and 
countenance,  as  represented  in  ancient  Greek  Art,  are  distinguished 
from  those  of  ordinary  Nature  (1849). 

The  Natural  Principles  of  Beauty  as  developed  in  the  human 
figure  (1852). 

The  Orthographic  Beauty  of  the  Parthenon,  referred  to  a  law  of 
Nature  (1853). 

The  Harmonic  Law  of  Nature,  applied  to  Architectural  Design 
(1855). 


214  The  PJiilosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

world  within  itself,  but  the  individual  mind  and  the  world 
at  large  have  a  relation  to  each  other.  The  subject  is 
affected  by  the  object.  .  .  .  The  science  of  aesthetics  is 
devoted  to  the  investigation  of  the  mode  in  which  external 
objects  affect  the  mind,  to  please  or  to  displease  it,  to  produce 
a  sense  of  harmony  or  of  discord.  Harmony  is,  as  Aris- 
totle defines  it,  the  union  of  contrary  principles  having  a 
ratio  to  each  other."  "  The  contrary  principles  are  those 
of  uniformity  and  variety,  which  give  rise  to  two  distinct 
kinds  of  beauty,  according  to  the  predominance  of  one  or 
the  other  of  them  in  an  object.  The  one  may  be  called 
symmetrical  beauty,  and  the  other  picturesque  beauty — the 
first  allied  to  the  principle  of  uniformity,  in  being  based 
upon  precise  laws  ;  the  second  allied  to  the  principle  of 
variety  to  so  great  a  degree  that  no  precise  laws  can  be  laid 
down  for  its  production"  (pp.  20,  21).  He  proceeds  to 
show  the  operation  of  harmonic  ratios,  first  on  rectilinear 
figures,  and  then  on  curvilinear  ones  ;  and  tries  to  prove 
that  by  their  union  the  laws  of  harmony  are  evolved 
(p.  40),  and  that  the  principles  of  harmony  which  he  has 
set  forth  are  "  a  natural  and  an  inherent  quality  in 
geometry  "  (p.  62). 

In  the  Scie7ice  of  Beauty,  as  developed  in  Nature,  and 
applied  in  Art,  Mr.  Hay  expands  his  doctrine,  his  aim 
being  to  prove  scientifically  that  the  Beautiful  in  Nature 
and  in  Art,  which  appeals  to  the  mind  through  the  eye,  is 
governed  by  the  same  laws  as  govern  the  ear  ;  in  other 
words,  that  Beauty  must  conform  to  the  laws  of  Nature  in  the 
plastic  art  of  painting,  as  well  as  in  the  sister  art  of  music. 
[In  this  he  was  partly  anticipated  by  a  work,  published  in 
1831,  The  Music  of  the  Eye;  or,  Essays  on  the  Principles  of 
the  Beauty  and  perfection  of  Architecture,  by  Peter  Legh, 
in  which  the  resemblance  of  music  to  Architecture  is  traced 
at  some  length,  Architecture  being  called  the  music  of 
the  eye.]  His  aim,  he  says,  is  "to  rise  superior  to  the 
idiosyncrasies  of  different  artists,  and  to  bring  back  to  one 
common  type  the  sensations  of  the  eye  and  of  the  ear." 
He  repeats,  almost  verbatim,  the  analyses  and  the  conten- 
tion of  his  former  book,  that  symmetry  gives  rise  to  beauty, 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  215 

and  variety  to  picturesqueness.  The  science  of  Beauty  is 
evolved  from  what  he  calls  the  "  harmonic  law  of  Nature," 
which  is  based  on  the  Pythagorean  system  of  numerical 
ratios.  He  applies  it  first  to  Sound,  and  afterwards 
to  Form  (especially  as  seen  in  the  form  of  the  human 
head,  countenance,  and  figure),  and  lastly  to  Colour,  and 
the  proportions  of  ancient  Greek  vases  and  ornaments.  He 
considers  all  aesthetic  science  as  "based  on  the  great 
harmonic  law  of  Nature,  which  pervades  and  governs  the 
universe  ;  and  which  lies,  as  such,  intermediate  between 
the  physical  and  the  metaphysical  sphere." 

In  an  article  in  the  Edinburgh  Review,  October  1843, 
Sir  David  Brewster  wrote  an  elaborate  criticism  of  Mr.  Hay's 
books  on  Harmonic  colouring,  and  the  Harmony  of  Form, 
chiefly  from  the  scientific  side. 

In  1848  an  Analysis  and  Theory  of  the  Emotions,  with 
dissertations  on  Beauty,  Sublimity,  and  the  Ludicrous,  was 
published  by  George  Ramsay,  the  author  of  several  philo- 
sophical works.  "We  must  always  bear  in  mind  these 
two  things  :  first,  that  the  Beauty  which  we  feel  must  be 
distinguished  from  the  outward  cause  which  excites  it ; 
secondly,  that  Beauty  is  an  emotion,  not  a  sensation  "  (p.  69). 
"  Wonder  and  love  may  combine  with  Beauty,  and  so  en- 
hance the  feeling,  but  they  are  not  essential  to  it."  "  It  is  a 
simple,  not  a  compound  emotion,  and  cannot  be  analysed." 
"  Beauty  and  Sublimity  are  distinguished  from  all  other 
emotions  by  the  incorporating  process,  whereby  the  mind 
unconsciously  communicates  its  own  feelings  to  outward 
objects,  clothing  dead  matter  with  the  nature  and  qualities 
of  spirit "  (p.  70).  Mr.  Ramsay  thought  that  Beauty  and 
Sublimity  were  quite  as  subjective  as  any  sensation,  or  as 
the  emotions  of  love,  hate,  fear,  and  wonder,  but  that  they 
were  distinguished  from  the  latter  by  this  incorporating 
process.  But  in  his  next  chapter,  "  on  the  source  of 
Beauty,"  he  opposes  the  association  theory  with  incisive 
vigour.  He  maintains  that  there  is  an  original  Cause  or 
Source  of  Beauty  in  the  world.  Association  cannot  create  ; 
it  can  only  arouse.  It  "may  change,  modify,  prevent,  pro- 
vided there  is  something  to  be  changed,  modified,  prevented  " 


216  The  Philosophy  of  tJie  Beautiful          CHAP. 

(p.  76).  He  sees  that  the  theory  which  explains  the 
Beautiful  by  association,  must  deal  similarly  with  the  True  ; 
and  that  neither  custom  nor  utility  can  account  for  the 
origin  of  Beauty.  In  his  third  chapter  he  deals  with  "  the 
real  sources  of  Beauty."  Premising  that  it  is  not  the 
ultimate  principle,  but  the  "  proximate  causes  "  that  he  is  in 
search  of,  he  traces  four  in  material  objects — viz.  (i)  Colour, 
(2)  Form,  (3)  Outward  Texture,  and  (4)  Inward  Composi- 
tion. In  his  second  part  he  discusses  Sublimity,  and 
wherein  it  differs  from  Beauty.  He  thinks  that  the  emotion 
of  the  sublime  is  not  simple,  as  that  of  Beauty  is,  but  is 
"  a  compound  of  wonder  and  fear,  the  result  of  the  two 
united"  (p.  133).  There  is  in  it  an  alloy  of  pain.  It  is  a 
more  violent  and  less  durable  emotion  than  the  feeling  of 
Beauty,  and  it  is  aroused  in  us  by  things  great,  by  things 
rare,  and  by  things  dangerous  (p.  142).  Ramsay's  analysis 
of  "the  Ludicrous  emotion"  (pp.  149-179)  is  a  useful 
supplement  to  an  acute  discussion. 


9.  Carlyle  to  Ruskin 

In  the  allusions  to  Art  scattered  throughout  the  writings 
of  Thomas  Carlyle,  we  find  the  germs  which  subsequently 
bore  conspicuous  fruit  in  the  teaching  of  John  Ruskin.  In 
Sartor  Resartus  (1831),  in  the  chapter  entitled  "  Symbols  " 
(Book  III.  ch.  iii.),  Carlyle  taught  that  it  is  through 
symbols  that  we  pass  from  the  visible  to  the  invisible.  "  In 
a  symbol  there  is  concealment,  and  yet  revelation,"  as  "by 
silence  and  speech  acting  together  comes  a  double 
significance."  In  the  Symbol  proper  there  is  ever  more 
or  less  distinctly  and  directly  some  embodiment  and  revela- 
tion of  the  Infinite.  "  The  Infinite  is  made  to  blend  itself 
with  the  finite,  to  stand  visible,  and  as  it  were  attainable 
there.  By  symbols  accordingly  is  man  guided  and  com- 
manded. .  .  .  Not  our  logical  mensurative  faculty,  but 
our  imaginative  one  is  king  over  us."  "  Sense  is  but  the 
implement  of  fancy.  ...  It  is  through  symbols  that  man, 
consciously  or  unconsciously,  lives,  works,  and  has  his  being." 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  217 

It  is,  however,  when  the  Divine  manifests  itself  through 
sense  that  symbols  have  intrinsic  meaning.  "  Of  this  sort 
are  all  true  works  of  art.  In  this  (if  we  know  a  Work  of 
Art  from  a  Daub  of  Artifice)  we  discern  Eternity  looking 
through  time,  the  Godlike  rendered  visible." 

In  Past  and  Present  (1843),  Book  II.  ch.  iv.,  there  are 
some  thoughts  on  the  Ideal  "  shooting  forth  into  practice  as 
it  can,"  and  "  growing  to  a  strange  reality."  "  The  Ideal 
has  always  to  grow  in  the  Real,  and  to  seek  out  its  bed  and 
board  there,  often  in  a  very  sorry  way."  "  By  a  law  of 
Nature,  all  ideals  have  their  fatal  limits  and  lot,  their 
appointed  periods  of  growth,  of  maturity,  of  decline,  de- 
gradation, death,  and  disappearance."  In  Book  III. 
chap.  x.  he  tells  us  that  "  all  human  things  do  require  to 
have  an  ideal  in  them,  to  have  some  soul  in  them,  were 
it  only  to  keep  the  body  unputrefied  ;  and  wonderful  it  is  to 
see  how  the  Ideal  or  Soul,  place  it  in  what  ugliest  body 
you  may,  will  irradiate  said  body  with  its  own  nobleness." 

Again,  in  one  of  the  Latter-Day  Pamphlets,  entitled 
"Jesuitism"  (August  1850),  he  admits  that  "it  is  to  the  Fine 
Arts  that  the  world's  chosen  souls  do  now  chiefly  take  refuge, 
and  attempt  that  '  worship  of  the  Beautiful '  may  thus  be 
possible  for  them.  .  .  .  Ever  must  the  Fine  Arts  be,  if  not 
religion,  yet  indissolubly  united  to  it,  dependent  on  it, 
vitally  blended  with  it  as  body  is  with  soul."  He  sees,  how- 
ever, that  there  may  be  unveracity  and  even  "Jesuitism" 
in  the  Fine  Arts,  and  how,  in  that  case,  its  "  thrice-unblessed 
presence  smites  the  genius  of  mankind  with  paralysis,"  how 
its  worship  ends  in  mere  dilettantism  and  empty  talk. 
"  The  Fine  Arts  divorcing  themselves  from  Truth,  are  quite 
certain  to  fall  mad,  if  they  do  not  die." 

In  Shooting  Niagara  he  writes  :  "  All  real  Art  is  the 
disimprisoned  soul  of  Fact." 

It  will  soon  be  seen  how  this  teaching  bore  fruit  in  the 
next  period  of  art-literature. 

From  1844  to  1848,  David  Scott,  one  of  the  most 
notable  of  Scottish  artists — in  ideality  of  design  perhaps 
the  most  original  of  them  all — wrote  what  he  called  "  Notes 
for  Memory,"  a  record  of  passing  thoughts,  feelings,  etc. 


218  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

In  February  1845  he  jotted  down  a  "basis  for  a  Theory  of 
Beauty."  "  Beauty  is  not  dependent  on  any  combination 
of  sensuous  qualities,  as  Burke  attempts  to  say ;  nor  is  it 
dependent  on  association  with  other  perceptions  or  sensa- 
tions ;  it  is  by  itself  and  ultimate.  It  may  terminate  in 
itself,  and  has  no  necessary  connection  with  other  qualities, 
mental  or  corporeal.  In  a  superhuman  existence  we  must 
imagine  it  always  present.  ...  A  confusion  of  tongues  on 
the  subject  has  resulted  from  the  so-called  differences  of 
opinion  of  different  nations.  But  there  is  in  reality  no 
such  difference  of  opinion,  except  in  the  degree  of  per- 
ception, or  in  the  grounds  of  decision.  ...  If  a  negro 
thinks  the  black  the  handsomer,  he  still  gives  his 
preference  to  a  quality  similar  in  its  nature  to  that 
which  guides  the  decisions  of  the  white.  Beauty  of  form 
and  of  colour  are  founded  in  all  cases  on  the  same 
perception,  but  all  the  forms  and  colours  may  be  different 
degrees  of  it.  In  form  and  colour,  however,  there  is  a 
highest,  and  here  lies  the  transcendental  root  of  the  matter. 
This  highest  is  purely  elemental  and  abstract — the  most 
primitive  sensations  in  both  resulting  from  lines,  and  the 
several  colours,  without  relation  to  combination  in  things. 
The  human  form  is  the  highest  combination.  We  can 
easily  refer  the  feeling  produced  in  us  by  it  to  certain  pro- 
perties, but  the  reason  of  this  feeling  is  beyond  the  under- 
standing" (Memoir  of  David  Scott,  by  William  B.  Scott 
(1850),  pp.  291,  292). 

Mr.  Ruskin  has  done  so  much  for  this  generation,  and 
for  all  time,  by  his  art-criticism,  and  he  has  made  us  his 
debtors  in  so  many  ways,  that  it  is  hard  to  deal  with  him  as 
a  philosopher,  in  the  same  way  as  we  deal  with  other  con- 
temporaries. 

As  the  second  volume  of  Modern  Painters,  which  gives 
us  Mr.  Ruskin's  view  of  the  Beautiful,  was  first  published 
in  1846,  his  contributions  to  the  literature  of  Esthetics, 
extending  over  nearly  half  a  century,  may  be  considered  at 
this  stage. 

Perhaps  the  chief  value  of  Ruskin's  art-criticism  is  that 
it  goes  beyond  Art  to  life,  that  it  binds  the  ethical,  the 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  219 

social,  and  the  artistic  within  one  supreme  category,  and 
that  it  is  so  varied  and  so  vital  in  reference  to  all  the  art- 
schools  of  the  world.  His  vindication  of  the  functions  and 
uses  of  Art  is  specially  noble,  because  he  is  much  more 
than  an  art-critic,  he  is  a  moralist  as  well,  and  it  is  from 
the  moralist's  point  of  view  that  he  almost  invariably  writes. 
A  somewhat  captious  critic,  who  writes  under  the  pseudo- 
nym of  Vernon  Lee,  has  remarked  in  Belcaro  that  he  has 
"  made  Morality  sterile,  and  Art  base,  in  his  desire  to  sanctify 
the  one  by  the  other."  *  In  opposition  to  this  verdict,  I 
would  say  that  Ruskin  has  almost  invariably  illumined  his 
art-criticism  by  his  subtle  side-glances  into  the  problems  of 
duty,  and  that  his  indirect  ethical  teaching — which  is  vastly 
superior  to  his  direct  moralising — has  lit  up  the  very 
foreground  of  the  field  of  Art.  Ruskin  is  not  a  moralist 
looking  down  on  Art,  or  an  art -critic  keeping  aloof  from 
moral  problems.  He  combines  the  two  functions  as  they 
have  never  been  combined  before.  Art  is  to  him,  at  its 
root,  not  only  moral  but  divine  ;  morals  are,  at  their  root, 
not  only  good  and  true,  but  beautiful. 

Plato  and  Plotinus  had  taught  that  Beauty  was  an 
emanation  from  the  Infinite,  and  a  disclosure  of  it.  They 
reached  this  by  a  speculative  intuition  from  above.  Our 
modern  art -teacher  has  reached  the  same  truth  from 
beneath.  He  holds  that,  in  the  perfectly  beautiful,  perfect 
goodness  lies  ;  so  that  men  may  buttress  their  lives  against 
the  inroads  of  selfishness  by  knowing  the  beautiful,  and 
loving  it  with  disinterested  emotion.  The  beautiful  and  the 
good  are  not  one,  but  diverse ;  nevertheless  they  are 
kindred  at  the  root,  and  have  very  subtle  affinities  and 
correspondences.  Suppose  a  moralist  to  raise  the  question, 
Why  should  I,  in  a  world  where  moral  evil  exists,  devote 
myself  to  the  Beautiful  at  all  ?  Ruskin's  answer  would  be, 
You  must  do  this,  in  the  very  interests  of  morality.  The 
Beautiful  must  not  only  be  known,  it  must  be  studied  and 
loved,  if  morality  is  to  be  either  attractive  or  stable.  It 
is  the  ethical  undertone  of  Modern  Painters  that  is  the 
supreme  charm  of  the  book.  One  may  dissent  from 
1  "  Essay  on  Ruskinism,"  p.  225. 


220  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

many  of  its  judgments  as  to  art,  but  its  interpretation  of  the 
soul  of  Nature,  of  the  correspondence  between  man  and 
Nature,  and  of  the  voice  that  comes  out  of  all  high  artistic 
work — which  rebukes  our  egotism  and  condemns  our  selfish- 
ness— has  no  parallel  in  the  previous  criticism  of  Art. 

Ruskin  has  no  new  and  distinctive  art-theory  to  unfold. 
As  Mr.  Edward  Cook  well  says,1  "  the  gospel  according  to 
Ruskin  is  one  of  glad  tidings,  not  of  news."  Of  his 
Modern  Painters  the  author  said  himself :  "  From  its  first 
syllable  to  its  last,  it  declares  the  perfectness  and  eternal 
beauty  of  the  work  of  God,  and  tests  all  work  of  man  by 
concurrence  with,  and  subjection  to  that."  And  yet  he  has 
given  us  no  satisfactory  definition  of  Beauty.  "  Any 
natural  object,"  he  says,2  "  which  can  give  us  pleasure  in 
the  simple  contemplation  of  its  outward  qualities  without 
any  direct  or  definite  exertion  of  the  intellect,  I  call  in  some 
way,  and  in  some  degree,  beautiful."  "  Ideas  of  Beauty,"  he 
adds,  "  are  the  subjects  of  moral,  but  not  of  intellectual  per- 
ception." The  discussion  of  "the  Ideas  of  Beauty"  in  the 
second  volume  (pt.  iii.)  is,  however,  ill  arranged,  and  some- 
what prolix.  Ruskin's  teaching  as  to  the  importance  of 
reality  or  Truth  in  Art  (notwithstanding  Carlyle's  praise  of  it 
as  a  "  divine  rage  against  falsity  ")  is,  after  all,  only  a  truism. 
His  criticism  of  inadequate  theories  of  the  beautiful  and  his 
exposure  of  the  craze  of  the  modern  "  esthete  "  (that  what 
pleases  the  senses  is  the  ultimate  criterion  of  all  good 
art)  is  excellent ;  but  when  he  goes  on  to  say  that  there  is 
no  other  definition  of  the  Beautiful  than  that  it  is  "what 
one  noble  spirit  has  created,  seen  and  felt  by  another  of 
similar  or  equal  nobility,"  we  feel  that  this  is  nearly  as 
inadequate  as  another  of  his  dicta  is  meagre,  that  "  all  great 
Art  is  praise." 

Beauty,  we  are  assured,  is  an  objective  reality,  and  it  is 
"the  expression  of  the  creating  spirit  of  the  universe."  So 
far  well;  but  when  we  are  further  told  that  it  consists  (i) 
in  certain  qualities  of  bodies  which  are  types  of  what  is 
divine,  and  (2)  in  "the  felicitous  fulfilment  of  function  in 

1  Studies  in  Ruskin,  p.  3. 
2  Modern  Painters,  vol.  i.  pt.  i.  ch.  vi. 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  221 

vital  things,"  we  do  not  find  ourselves  helped  forward 
theoretically.  Ruskin's  discussion  is  philosophically  unsys- 
tematic to  the  last  degree.  Though  lit  up  by  passages  of 
rarest  insight,  it  is  arbitrary  and  inconclusive.  It  lacks 
precision,  while  the  notes  to  the  last  edition,  which  fre- 
quently disown  the  conclusions  of  the  earlier  text,  are  some- 
what distracting.  Then  his  terminology  is  arbitrary.  Why 
should  he  call  the  aesthetic  faculty,  or  the  power  which 
deals  with  Beauty,  the  "  theoretic  faculty  "  ?  The  division 
of  the  kinds  or  classes  of  Beauty  into  typical  and  vital,  is 
also  open  to  criticism.  The  beauty  of  the  natural  inorganic 
world  he  calls  typical,  because  it  is  emblematic  of  tran- 
scendent beauty.  This  typical  beauty,  "  whether  it  occurs 
in  a  stone,  flower,  beast,  or  man,  is  absolutely  identical " 
(§  i,  ch.  iii.),  and  its  elements  or  constituents  are  In- 
finity, which  is  the  type  of  the  Divine  incomprehensibility; 
Unity,  which  is  the  type  of  the  Divine  comprehensiveness  ; 
Repose,  which  is  the  type  of  Divine  Permanence ;  Symmetry, 
the  type  of  Divine  Justice;  Purity,  the  type  of  Divine 
Energy ;  Moderation,  the  type  of  Divine  Government  by 
law ;  and  he  speaks  of  all  this  beauty  as  a  "  characteristic 
of  mere  matter."  The  latter  class  of  Beauty  (vital  Beauty) 
is  "the  felicitous  fulfilment  of  function  in  living  things, 
more  especially  the  joyful  and  right  exertion  of  perfect  life 
in  man,"  and  it  is  either  relative  or  generic. 

Having  finished  his  treatment  of  the  theoretic  faculty, 
Ruskin  goes  on  to  deal  with  the  imaginative.  He  says  that 
the  sources  of  Beauty  which  exist  in  the  external  world  are 
never  put  before  us  in  a  pure  transcript.  They  always 
receive  the  reflection  of  the  mind.  This  is  the  work  of  the 
imagination.  In  the  study  of  imagination,  the  metaphysicians 
afford  us  no  aid  whatsoever,  because  they  are  trying  to 
explain  to  us  the  essence  of  the  faculties,  whereas  the 
imagination  is  "utterly  mysterious  and  inexplicable,  and 
to  be  recognised  in  its  results  only."  Surely  this  is  true  of 
all  the  faculties.  Mr.  Ruskin  next  says  that  imagination 
is  the  source  of  all  that  is  great  in  Art,  and  departing  from 
the  agnostic  position  he  had  just  laid  down,  goes  on  to 
define  the  action  of  the  imagination  as  "penetrative, 


222  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

associative,    and    contemplative "    in    a    highly    suggestive 
analysis. 

Mr.  Ruskin  is  not  successful  as  a  speculative  philosopher. 
Indeed  he  expressly  forswears  metaphysics ;  but  when  he 
keeps  to  art-criticism  and  ethical  teaching  in  detail ;  when 
he  shows,  for  example,  how  Art  and  Religion  are  twin 
sisters  ;  how  you  cannot  understand  the  former  without 
reverencing  it ;  how  the  reverence  that  comes  from  a  true 
perception  of  Beauty  is  religious ;  and  how  the  beauty  of 
Nature  is  a  reflection  of  the  beauty  of  character — in  all  this 
his  teaching  is  unique,  and  of  lasting  value. 


i  o.  Lord  Lindsay  to  Professor  Bain 

In  his  Sketches  of  the  History  of  Christian  Art  (1847) 
Lord  Lindsay  has  a  prefatory  note  on  "  the  Ideal."  His 
reading  of  the  history  of  the  race  as  a  whole,  is  not  so 
successful  as  his  subsequent  discussion.  He  thinks  that 
the  three  elements  of  Human  Nature,  "  sense,  intellect,  and 
spirit,"  "had  their  distinct  development  at  three  distinct 
intervals,  and  in  the  personality  of  the  three  great  branches 
of  the  human  family."  The  African  races  developed  the 
first,  the  Greeks  the  second,  and  the  Jews  and  Christians 
the  third. 

"The  peculiar  interest  and  dignity  of  Art  consists  in  her  exact 
correspondence  in  her  three  departments  with  these  three  periods  of 
development,  and  in  the  illustration  she  thus  affords — more  clearly 
and  markedly  even  than  Literature — to  the  truth  that  men  stand  or 
fall  according  as  they  look  up  to  the  Ideal,  or  not."  "  The  archi- 
tecture of  Egypt,  her  pyramids  and  temples,  express  the  ideal  of 
sense.  The  sculpture  of  Greece  is  the  voice  of  intellect  and 
thought ;  while  the  painting  of  Christendom  is  that  of  an  immortal 
spirit.  The  Christian  is  superior  to  the  classic  Art,  because  the 
Greek  ideas  were  youth,  grace,  beauty,  thought,  dignity,  and 
power.  Form,  consequently,  or  the  expression  of  mind,  was  what 
they  chiefly  aimed  at,  and  in  this  they  reached  perfection." 
"Faith,  hope,  and  charity — these  wings  of  immortality — as- yet 
serve  art."  "It  is  not  symmetry  of  form,  or  beauty  of  colouring," 
that  give  to  the  Art  of  Christendom  its  vantage.  "It  is  the  depth, 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  223 

intensity,  grandeur,  and  sweetness  of  the  emotions  at  the  command 
of  the  Christian  artists,  as  compared  with  those  elicited  by  the 
ancients"  (vol.  i.  p.  xv.). 

The  analogy  which  Lord  Lindsay  afterwards  draws 
between  Architecture,  Sculpture,  and  Painting,  and  the 
three  persons  in  the  Christian  Trinity,  is  more  than  un- 
fortunate. But,  when  he  leaves  these  generalisations, 
and  enters  on  his  criticism  in  detail,  his  analysis  is 
remarkable,  and  it  opens  up  a  new  track  in  the  historical 
study  of  Art.  His  "  general  classification  "  of  Schools  and 
Artists  (vol.  i.  pp.  ccix.-ccxlvii.),  his  record  of  the  develop- 
ment of  the  Architecture  of  Christendom  from  the  ancient 
basilica,  his  summary  of  Roman  and  Byzantine  Art 
generally,  his  account  of  the  rise  of  the  Lombard  style, 
and  then  of  the  Gothic  (both  north  and  south  of  the  Alps), 
are  all  extremely  learned  and  able ;  while  his  analyses  of 
the  work  of  Niccola  Pisano,  and  of  Giotto  (vol.  ii.  letters  3 
and  4),  are  fine  instances  of  subtle  discriminative  criticism. 
One  sentence  from  his  account  of  Niccola  Pisano  may  be 
quoted  : — 

"Niccola's  peculiar  praise  is  this — that  in  practice  at  least,  if 
not  in  theory,  he  first  established  the  principle  that  the  study  of 
Nature,  corrected  by  the  ideal  of  the  antique,  and  animated  by 
the  spirit  of  Christianity,  personal  and  social,  can  alone  lead  to 
excellence  in  Art ;  each  of  the  three  elements  of  Human  Nature 
(Matter,  Mind,  and  Spirit)  being  thus  brought  into  union,  in  relative 
harmony  and  subordination.  It  was  in  this  that  Niccola  himself 
worked.  It  has  been  by  following  it  that  Donatello,  and  Ghiberti, 
Leonardo,  Raphael,  and  Michael  Angelo  have  risen  to  glory. 
The  Sienese  School  and  the  Florentine — minds  contemplative  and 
dramatic  —  are  alike  beholden  to  it  for  whatever  success  has 
attended  their  efforts.  Like  a  treble-stranded  rope,  it  drags  after 
it  the  triumphal  car  of  Christian  Art.  But  if  either  of  the  strands 
be  broken,  if  either  of  the  three  elements  be  pursued  disjointedly 
from  the  other  two,  the  result  is  grossness,  pedantry,  or  weakness  " 
(vol.  ii.  letter  3,  pp.  102,  103). 

If  sometimes  too  rhetorical,  Lord  Lindsay's  work  is,  in 
many  respects,  a  monumental  one. 

In  the  November  number  of  the  British  Quarterly 
Review  in  1848,  there  is  an  able  article  (No.  IX.)  on  "the 


224  The  Philosophy  of  t/te  Beautiful          CHAP. 

Beautiful  and  the  Picturesque."  Their  difference  is  thus 
signalised.  In  an  object  that  is  picturesque  the  details  are 
never  grasped  in  their  entirety.  They  are  so  multiform 
and  varied,  that  the  mind  is  not  quite  at  rest  regarding 
them.  With  an  object  that  is  beautiful,  on  the  contrary, 
the  whole  is  obvious  to  the  eye  at  once ;  the  details  are 
taken  in  with  ease.  Therefore  a  picturesque  object  is 
complex  and  manifold,  a  beautiful  object  is  simple,  uniform, 
and  regular.  Because  we  take  in  the  former  with  some 
difficulty,  it  excites  a  prolonged  or  continuous  interest,  and 
does  not  weary  us.  Apprehending  the  latter  with  ease,  it 
sooner  wearies  us.  An  oak  tree,  for  example,  is  picturesque, 
because  it  is  multitudinous  \  a  beggar  is  picturesque,  because 
his  garments  are  irregular  and  various.  A  lily,  on  the  con- 
trary, is  beautiful,  because  it  is  a  whole  that  is  taken  in  at 
a  glance  with  ease  ;  this  ease  is  partly  the  source  of  our 
delight.  The  same  object  may,  however,  be  both  beautiful 
and  picturesque,  in  different  situations  and  circumstances 
— e.g.  a  sea  when  calm,  and  the  same  sea  disturbed  with 
storm  ; 1  or  the  Parthenon,  which  when  newly  built  was 
beautiful,  but  now  in  ruin  is  picturesque.  The  distinction 
between  the  two  is  applied — (i)  to  Nature,  (2)  to  Art 
products,  (3)  to  the  human  figure,  and  (4)  to  patterns  in 
articles  of  dress  and  of  household  use. 

The  writer  then  applies  the  same  principle  to  Archi- 
tecture ;  and  explains  the  effect  of  the  Gothic  over  us, 
because  it  combines  the  beautiful  with  the  picturesque.  In 
Greek  architecture  we  have  Beauty  alone,  in  Gothic  the 
two  are  combined.  He  also  says  that  we  may  explain  the 
difference  of  opinion  which  exists  as  to  the  Beauty  and 
Deformity  of  the  Human  Countenance,  not  only  from 
custom  and  fashion,  but  also  from  the  fact  that,  while  the 
Greek  ideal  of  regular  form  is  unquestionably  superior  to 
all  that  is  irregular,  expression  lighting  up  the  latter  (or 
even  an  otherwise  ugly  countenance)  may  make  it  appear 
finer  than  one  that  is  perfect  in  form. 

In    1849,    Mr.   James   Ferguson   issued  An  Historical 

1  Take  Peele  Castle,  as  described  by  Wordsworth  in  the  first  and 
second  stanzas  of  his  poem,  or  the  picture  of  it  by  Sir  George  Beaumont. 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  225 

Enquiry  into  the  true  principles  of  Beauty  in  Art,  more 
especially  with  reference  to  Architecture.  This  was,  in  some 
respects,  a  retrograde  work  ;  in  others,  a  real  contribution 
to  the  subject.  In  his  "  Introduction  "  (pt.  ii.  §  6)  he  dis- 
cusses the  "  Fine  Arts,"  and  affirms  that 

"  Beauty,  or  the  sense  of  Beauty,  means  really  nothing  more  than 
the  gratification  which  we  are  able  to  extract  out  of  every  useful 
function  we  perform.  ...  It  is  thus  that  all  the  useful  arts  are 
capable  of  becoming  Fine  Arts ;  or,  in  other  words,  besides 
ministering  to  our  necessities,  they  may  become  sources  of  pleasure. 
.  .  .  All  common  and  useful  things  may  be  refined  into  objects  of 
Beauty ;  and,  though  common,  all  the  beautiful  and  high  in  Art  is 
merely  an  elaboration  and  refinement  of  what  is  fundamentally  a 
useful  and  a  necessary  act." 

In  the  Introduction  to  his  elaborate  History  of  Archi- 
tecture in  all  Countries  (1874),  Mr.  Ferguson  restates  and 
condenses  his  view ;  but  his  statement  of  it  is  freshest  and 
fullest  in  the  earlier  work. 

The  want  of  success  in  attempted  definitions  of  "  Beauty 
in  Art  "  has  been  due,  he  thinks,  to  the  very  erroneous  idea 
that  the  sense  of  Beauty  "is  one  single  and  well-defined 
emotion,  whereas,  in  truth,  nothing  can  be  more  various." 
Beauty  has  three  types  or  classes.  The  first  is  technical  or 
mechanical  Beauty.  A  merely  useful  Art  can  belong  to 
this  class,  as  when  one  says  that  a  thing  is  beautifully  fitted 
for  its  purpose.  The  second  class  is  aesthetic  or  sensuous 
Beauty ;  and  when  this  is  combined  with  technic  beauty, 
we  have  many  of  the  Fine  Arts,  e.g.  painting  and  music. 
The  third  is  intellectual  Beauty,  which  may  be  presented  to 
us  through  words,  or  conventional  signs  only.  The  most 
perfect  Art  is  a  combination  of  all  the  three ;  and  one  work 
of  Art  is  more  perfect  than  another  in  proportion  as  the 
aesthetic  predominates  over  the  merely  technical,  and  the 
intellectual  predominates  over  the  merely  aesthetic.  These 
are  the  three  great  types  or  classes  of  the  Beautiful ;  but 
between  them  there  are  gradations  innumerable,  and  mani- 
fold combinations  and  shades.  We  may  have  mere 
technical  excellence  in  art,  we  may  have  the  sensuous 
element  in  excess,  or  the  intellectual  expression  all-domi- 

Q 


226  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

nant.  In  the  sub-sections,  which  Ferguson  indicates,  there 
is  much  that  is  arbitrary,  with  much  that  is  suggestive,  and 
his  historical  criticism  is  very  valuable,  e.g.  in  the  com- 
parisons he  draws  between  the  Egyptian  and  Greek  art,  in 
the  former  of  which  he  considers  that  the  technical  pre- 
vailed, and  in  the  latter  the  aesthetic.  His  remarks  on 
association  are  also  good.  The  scenes  of  childhood,  national 
melodies,  etc.,  are  dearer  to  us  by  association ;  and  in 
Architecture  and  Sculpture  we  are  under  the  slavery  of 
precedent.  "  Though  I  am  far  from  denying,"  he  says, 
"  the  beneficial  influence  of  association  in  Art,  when  properly 
used,  it  is  at  best  only  a  slavish  and  retrograde  source  of 
Beauty,  in  every  respect  inferior  to  those  derived  from 
perfection,  and  harmony,  and  imagination"  (pp.  145,  146). 
Form  and  Sound,  can  their  beauty  be  dependent  on  the 
same  physical  laws?  "a  critical  enquiry,"  by  Thomas 
Purdie,  published  in  1848,  is  the  record  of  a  controversy 
with  Mr.  Hay.  Mr.  Purdie  followed  Alison,  Brown,  and 
Jeffrey  in  their  association  doctrine  ;  but  he  admits  that  the 
emotion  of  Beauty  is  also  "direct  and  original,"  and  that, 
although  association  may  always  "  lend  a  charm  to  beauti- 
ful things,"  it  is  not  always  the  origin  of  the  emotion  of 
Beauty.  The  sensations  produced  in  us  by  natural  objects 
directly,  are  also  one  source  of  the  emotions  of  the  Beautiful. 
There  are  "objects,  the  beauty  of  which  addresses  the 
intellect  alone  "  (p.  xli.).  Beauty  is  as  well  entitled  to  be 
considered  a  primary  and  direct  emotion  as  fear,  loss,  hope, 
or  the  sense  of  the  ludicrous.  "^Esthetics  and  ethics  are 
entitled  to  hold  precisely  the  same  rank  "  (p.  xlviii.).  "  The 
highest  of  all  beauty  is  expression  "  (p.  xlvii.).  Mr.  Purdie 
opposes  Cousin's  doctrine  of  Absolute  Beauty,  and  falls  back 
on  the  agreement  of  mankind.  He  questions  if  primitive 
man  had  any  idea  of  Beauty,  and  considers  it  only  as  a 
state  of  mind,  not  as  a  quality  of  objects.  He  thinks  there 
is  no  analogy  between  beauty  of  Sound  and  beauty  of  Form  : 
the  one  is  fixed  by  definite  rule ;  the  other,  infinitely 
diversified,  cannot  be  reduced  to  rule.  And  so  we  find  that 
the  fundamental  principles  of  music  are  universally  adopted, 
while  men  do  not  agree  as  to  beauty  of  form.  The  work 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  227 

contains  much  acute  thinking,  but  is  disfigured  by  the 
bitterness  of  its  attack  on  Mr.  Hay. 

In  1850,  Lord  Iddesleigh  (then  Sir  Stafford  Northcote) 
gave  a  lecture  on  Taste  to  the  Literary  Society  at  Exeter. 
It  is  reproduced  in  his  posthumous  Lectures  and  Essays 
(1887).  It  was  suggested  by  the  preparations  then  being 
made  for  the  first  International  Exhibition  of  Art  and 
Industry  in  1851.  The  laws  of  taste  and  of  the  beautiful 
are  founded  on  the  study  of  Nature  ;  and  a  safe  test  of  good 
art  is  its  accordance  with  Nature.  Nothing  is  beautiful  that 
is  unnatural ;  but  this  does  not  mean  that  Art's  sole  function 
is  to  copy  Nature.  It  only  means  that  all  good  Art  is 
fashioned  on  the  same  principles  as  those  on  which  Nature 
is  constructed.  Ornamental  Art  does  not  merely  copy,  it 
creates  ;  but  the  ornament  "  must  be  capable  of  removal 
without  impairing  the  utility  of  the  construction."  That  is 
the  first  great  rule  in  art  ornamentation  ;  and  the  second  is 
that  the  ornament  must  not  destroy  or  even  interfere  with 
the  use.  The  fundamental  laws  of  Taste  are — (i)  truth  or 
honesty,  reality,  the  absence  of  pretence  ;  (2)  suitableness, 
a  leading  idea  being  present,  to  which  all  else  is  subordinate  ; 
(3)  the  love  of  Beauty  for  its  own  sake. 

In  1852,  George  Butler,  of  Exeter  College,  Oxford, 
afterwards  Canon  of  Winchester,  published  four  lectures  on 
The  Principles  of  Imitative  Art,  which  he  had  delivered  to 
the  Oxford  Art  Society,  and  elsewhere,  in  the  same  year. 
They  are  based  on  Aristotle's  theory,  as  unfolded  in  the 
Poetics.  He  held  that  all  art  is  the  imitation  of  an  image 
in  the  mind,  either  awakened  by  an  external  object,  or 
arising  from  within.  In  discussing  the  question  what 
Beauty  is,  he  starts  from  the  groundwork  of  the  senses, 
which  in  the  main  suggest  the  same  ideas  to  different 
individuals  (p.  26).  He  then  explains,  and  in  the  main 
follows,  Burke's  theory,  but  at  the  same  time  admits  an 
external  standard  or  "canon  of  proportion."  He  sinks 
back,  however,  without  reason,  to  the  doctrine  of  relativity, 
affirming  that  what  we  call  Beauty  is  really  our  feeling  for 
Beauty,  which  is  different  in  degree  in  different  individuals. 
The  Beautiful  is  various,  and  the  artist  should  aim  at 


228  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

variety,  finding  the  standard  of  Beauty  within  himself.  On 
the  other  hand,  Mr.  Butler's  width  of  view  comes  out  in  the 
admission  that  in  Art  "  we  look  for  something  beyond  the 
reproduction  of  the  actual"  (p.  38). 

Some  of  the  review  articles  on  the  subject  of  the  Beautiful 
are  quite  as  valuable  links  in  the  evolving  chain  of  literary 
discussion  as  are  the  treatises  devoted  to  it.  There  was, 
for  example,  in  Blackwood's  Magazine  for  December  1853, 
a  review  of  Jeffrey,  M< Vicar,  and  Hay  which  was  as  good 
as  many  a  volume.  The  writer  holds  that,  if  there  be  no 
standard  of  the  Beautiful,  "  novelty  "  is  all  that  is  left  to  us 
in  art-work.  We  can  no  longer  speak  of  the  great  masters, 
or  of  any  masters.  If  association  can  explain  the  beautiful, 
then  the  study  of  ^Esthetics  is  but  labour  lost,  (i)  Beauty 
is,  on  the  last  analysis,  but  another  name  for  perfection. 
The  beauty  of  individual  things  is  various  ;  but  the  beauty 
of  all  beautiful  things  agrees  in  this,  that  they  all  approach 
perfection,  and  delight  us  according  as  they  do  so.  (2) 
Beauty  (which  is  perfection)  is  "  as  diverse  in  its  forms  as 
the  several  faculties  and  organs  by  which  we  come  into  con- 
tact with  Nature."  (3)  These  forms  of  the  Beautiful  are 
divisible  into  two  great  classes,  viz.  the  intellectual  and  the 
material.  In  his  criticism  of  the  association  theory,  the 
writer  asks  how  it  comes  to  pass  that  a  circle  is  regarded, 
"  semper,  ubique,  et  ab  omnibus,"  as  more  beautiful  than 
an  irregular  figure,  unless  there  be  a  standard  of  beauty  in 
the  mind  ?  So  also  with  colours  and  sounds.  Differences 
in  taste  prove  nothing  against  a  standard ;  because  each 
taste  may  have  a  standard  for  itself,  and  yet  they  may  all 
vary,  just  as  Greek  and  Gothic  architecture  vary,  or  as  the 
several  types  of  heroic  action  do.  The  writer  affirms  truly 
that  "  the  beautiful  and  the  good  stand  together  on  the 
same  pedestal."  We  cannot  hold  by  the  one,  and  despise 
the. other.  Acoustic  science  shows  that  the  beautiful  in 
music  is  based  on  certain  objective  harmonious  ratios  ;  so 
with  the  beauty  of  colours.  "  Unity  and  variety  are  the 
two  grand  elements  in  all  fine  art  compositions  ;  and  unity 
in  variety  (in  other  words,  symmetry)  is  the  first  thing  to 
be  attended  to  in  aesthetical  science." 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  229 

The  principle  of  symmetry  in  material  Beauty  is,  in 
music,  the  fundamental  chord.  How,  and  why,  are  the 
fundamental  notes  in  music  more  pleasing  than  others  ? 
When  any  musical  note  is  struck,  other  notes  may  be  heard 
sounding  as  it  dies  away  ;  and  every  sounding  body  has  a 
tendency  to  excite  an  identical  note  in  all  sonorous  bodies 
near  it,  so  that  they  vibrate  in  unison  (or  nearly  so)  in 
varying  ratios — "  the  notes  produced  being  called  respect- 
ively the  tonic,  the  mediant,  and  the  dominant,  which  in 
unison  with  the  keynote  form  the  fundamental  chord  in 
music."  These  harmonic  notes  please  us,  because  they 
sustain  to  each  other  the  simplest  and  most  perfect 
proportions. 

Ideal  Beauty  is  not  to  be  found  by  a  merely  eclectic 
combination  of  detached  excellences  existing  in  Nature. 
It  is  not  found  in  external  Nature,  but  in  the  mind  of 
man — 

On  Earth  there's  nothing  great  but  Man, 
In  Man  there's  nothing  great  but  Mind. 

Ideal  Beauty  is  reached  by  the  mind  either  through 
criticism  or  creation.  The  external  world  stirs  the  inner, 
and  the  latter  creates  objects  of  its  own,  as  vivid  and  real 
as  those  of  the  former. 

Typical  Forms  and  Special  Ends  in  Creation,  by  Pro- 
fessors M'Cosh  and  Dickie  of  Belfast,  was  published  in 
1856.  It  is  a  treatise  on  Natural  History  and  Theology; 
but  in  Book  III.  chapter  ii.  sec.  4  there  is  a  discussion  of 
"the  aesthetic  sentiments."  The  authors  affirm  that  the 
effort  to  find  out  in  what  physical  beauty  consists  have  been 
"  so  far  successful."  They  endorse  the  views  of  M 'Vicar  and 
Hay ;  but  they  affirm  that  even  if  physical  science  shall 
have  demonstrated  their  views,  the  phenomena  of  Beauty 
will  not  be  fully  explained,  because  the  correlated  mental 
sentiment  has  also  to  be  explained.  They  think  that  mere 
perfection  of  form  is  insufficient  to  explain  the  feeling 
called  forth  by  the  beautiful.  It  is  only  "when  there 
is  something  to  indicate  that  there  has  been  more 
than  mechanism  at  work"  (p.  483)  that  we  recognise  the 


230  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

beautiful.  They  think  that  the  sense  of  beauty  in  organic 
objects  is  called  forth  by  the  union  of  the  TI'TTOS  with  the 
reAos,  the  typical  form  with  the  special  end  in  creation. 
They  admit,  on  the  one  hand,  an  original  principle  of 
beauty  in  the  world,  and  an  original  feeling  for  beauty  in 
man  ;  and,  on  the  other,  the  influence  of  association  in 
modifying  and  warping  the  faculties  ;  and  they  thus  account 
for  "what  is  fixed  in  aesthetics — the  uniformity  of  judgment 
in  matters  of  taste,"  and  "  for  what  differs  in  different  in- 
dividuals "  (p.  488). 

A  very  elaborate  and  valuable  work  on  The  Grammar 
of  Ornament,  by  Owen  Jones,  was  published  in  1856.  His 
aim,  as  stated  by  himself,  was,  by  "  bringing  into  immediate 
juxtaposition  the  many  forms  of  Beauty  which  every  style 
of  ornament  presents,"  to  "aid  in  arresting  that  unfortunate 
tendency  to  be  content  with  copying,  whilst  the  fashion 
lasts,  the  forms  peculiar  to  any  bygone  age,  without 
attempting  to  ascertain  the  circumstances  which  rendered 
an  ornament  beautiful  because  it  was  appropriate."  He 
thought  that  if  a  student  of  the  Beautiful  would  search  out 
the  thoughts  of  the  past,  he  would  find  "  an  ever-gushing 
fountain  in  place  of  a  half-filled  stagnant  reservoir."  Mr. 
Jones  endeavours  to  establish  four  things — (i)  that  when 
any  style  of  ornament  is  universally  admired,  it  is  in 
accordance  with  the  principles  of  form  which  exist  in 
Nature ;  (2)  that,  however  varied  the  manifestations  of 
Beauty  may  be,  the  leading  ideas  on  which  they  are  based 
are  very  few ;  (3)  that  the  changes  and  developments  of 
style  have  been  due  to  the  "  sudden  throwing  off  of  some 
fixed  trammel,  which  set  thought  free  for  a  time,  till  the 
new  idea,  like  the  old,  became  again  fixed,  to  give  birth 
in  its  turn  to  fresh  inventions "  ;  (4)  that  future  progress 
is  only  to  be  secured  by  "a  return  to  Nature  for  fresh 
inspiration." 

Mr.  Jones  lays  down  37  Propositions,  embodying  general 
principles  as  to  the  arrangement  of  Form  and  Colour,  in 
architecture,  and  the  decorative  Arts,  in  which  there 
is  a  great  deal  of  aesthetic  wisdom  ;  e.g.  (Proposition  4) 
"  True  Beauty  results  from  that  repose  which  the  mind 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  231 

feels,  when  the  eye,  the  intellect,  and  the  affections,  are 
satisfied  from  the  absence  of  any  want."  "  Beauty  of 
Form  is  produced  by  lines  growing  out  one  from  the  other 
in  gradual  undulations  :  there  are  no  excrescences  ;  nothing 
could  be  removed  and  leave  the  design  equally  good  or 
better."  His  propositions  on  the  relation  of  Colour  to 
Form  are  extremely  valuable  ;  and  throughout,  his  demand 
for  general  principles  is  noteworthy.  He  says  (Proposition 
36)  :  "The  principles  discoverable  in  the  works  of  the  past 
belong  to  us  ;  not  so  the  results." 

The  discussion  of  Mr.  Jones  and  his  friends,  on  savage 
Art,  on  Egyptian,  Assyrian,  and  Persian  ornament,  on 
Greek,  Roman,  Byzantine,  Arabian  Art,  etc.,  are  all  valu- 
able. Their  condensed  form  is  not  due  to  haste,  or  to 
want  of  thoroughness,  but  to  the  extent  of  research,  and  the 
power  of  epitomising  results.  The  pre-eminence  he  assigns 
to  Egyptian  Art,  however,  is  questionable.  He  places  it 
in  a  position  of  superiority  to  all  the  rest  of  the  art  of  the 
world.  If  other  styles  approach  perfection  only  in  so  far 
as  they  follow  the  Egyptian,  it  would  seem  that  the  race 
had  fallen  from  perfection.  The  Grammar  of  Ornament, 
like  Charles  Blanc's  book  (see  p.  128),  is  a  standard  work 
on  its  subject. 

In  1857,  Mr.  A.  J.  Symington  wrote  a  diffuse  though 
suggestive  book,  entitled  The  Beautiful  in  Nature,  Art, 
and  Life.  It  is  full  of  appreciative  and  scattered  know- 
ledge of  all  kinds  ;  but  it  is  far  too  rhetorical,  too  full  of 
poetical  extracts  and  unverified  quotations.  It  has  proved 
a  useful  book  to  many,  and  if  one  goes  to  it  without  great 
knowledge  of  the  subject,  a  sympathetic  spirit  will  gain  much 
from  its  genuine  enthusiasm,  and  from  the  idealism  which 
pervades  it.  Mr.  Symington's  appreciation  of  the  musical 
schools  deserves  special  notice. 

A  short  treatise  on  The  Principles  of  Art,  by  John 
Addington  Symonds,  M.D.,  was  published  in  1857.  It 
had  its  origin  in  a  lecture  given  to  the  Canynge  Society, 
formed  for  the  restoration  of  the  Church  of  St.  Mary 
Redcliffe  in  Bristol,  and  is  in  the  main  an  exposition  and 
defence  of  Mr.  Hay's  teaching  on  the  subject  of  Beauty, 


232  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

especially  his  theory  that  the  proportions  of  visible  beauty 
are  strictly  analogous  to  the  ratios  which  govern  music  ;  the 
author  thinking  that  Mr.  Hay  had  done  more  than  any 
other  writer  to  find  out  the  scientific  basis  of  Beauty  of 
Form.  He  first  discusses  the  Beauty  that  is  disclosed 
through  the  senses  of  sight  and  hearing,  noting  the  pleasure 
given  by  variety,  continuity,  and  similarity  in  the  sensations 
thence  arising.  He  offers  a  physiological  explanation  of 
the  pleasures  derived  from  Beauty  of  Form,  tracing  them  to 
rhythmical  muscular  action.  He  next  considers  intellectual 
and  moral  beauty,  and  what  he  calls  "the  associated 
emotions " ;  but  in  these  sections  he  deals  merely  with 
certain  powers  of  the  mind,  or  of  feeling,  the  exercise  of 
which  gives  pleasure.  A  subsequent  section  is  devoted  to 
Ideal  Beauty,  which  is  due,  he  thinks,  to  the  activity  of  the 
Imagination,  which  in  exercise  gives  rise  to  Art,  Poetry, 
etc.  Art  includes  Nature.  "  It  is  Nature,  and  something 
more.  Nature  is  substance  existing  in  certain  forms,  full 
of  forces  that  are  latent  or  actively  at  work."  But  man  can 
"contemplate  these  objects  under  other  forms,  forms  of  his 
own  invention,  that  have  a  fascination  of  their  own,"  and 
which,  though  "  taken  from  Nature,"  are  "  fairer  and  grander 
than  Nature  can  supply"  (pp.  58,  59). 

In  1858,  J.  S.  Blackie,  Professor  of  Greek  in  the  Uni- 
versity of  Edinburgh,  published  three  discourses  On  Beauty, 
delivered  in  the  University  of  Edinburgh,  with  an  exposition 
of  the  doctrine  of  the  Beautiful,  according  to  Plato.  It  is 
an  enthusiastic  defence  of  the  Platonic  doctrine  of  Beauty, 
against  the  empiricists,  and  especially  the  associationalists. 
In  his  first  discourse  he  deals  with  order,  symmetry,  pro- 
portion, and  congruity  ;  in  the  second,  with  the  ludicrous, 
perfection,  the  sublime,  and  the  infinite  ;  in  the  third,  with 
expressiveness,  moderation,  smoothness,  delicacy,  and  cur- 
vature, variety,  novelty,  contrast,  and  the  association  of 
ideas  ;  and  in  an  appendix  he  discusses  the  doctrine  of 
Plato.  It  has  the  merit  of  defending  the  Platonic  view  of 
Beauty,  with  great  force  and  wealth  of  illustration,  against 
the  degenerate  teaching  of  the  soi-disant  Edinburgh  school 
of  Alison  and  Jeffrey. 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  233 

In  his  Emotions  and  the  Will  (1859)  and  in  his  Mental 
and  Moral  Science  (1868)  Professor  Alexander  Bain  has 
discussed  the  subject  of  the  "aesthetic  emotions."  He 
defines  them  as  "the  group  of  feelings  involved  in  the 
various  Fine  Arts."  They  have  three  characteristics — (i) 
they  have  pleasure  for  their  immediate  end ;  (2)  they 
have  no  disagreeable  accompaniments ;  (3)  their  enjoy- 
ment is  not  restricted  to  one  or  two,  but  can  be  shared  by 
many.  The  eye  and  the  ear  are  the  two  senses  through 
which  aesthetic  pleasure  reaches  us  ;  but  what  appeals  to 
the  other  senses,  and  reaches  us  through  them,  may  also 
become  the  subject  of  Art,  by  being  idealised.  The  source 
of  beauty  is  not  one  single  quality,  but  many  qualities. 
What  may  come  within  the  domain  of  Fine  Art  are — ( I ) 
the  emotions  of  eye  and  ear,  in  their  elements  ;  (2)  the 
intellectual  resuscitation  of  them,  other  senses  co-operating 
in  their  revival ;  (3)  the  special  emotions,  wonder,  surprise, 
novelty,  etc.  ;  (4)  Harmony.  Mr.  Bain  next  discusses, 
with  some  repetition,  the  pleasurable  emotions  of  sound, 
with  their  harmonies,  and  the  pleasurable  sensations  of 
sight,  with  their  harmonies  ;  proceeding  thence  to  complex 
harmonies,  fitness  of  means  to  ends,  and  unity  in  diversity. 
He  then  considers  the  sublime  as  a  sentiment  due  to  the 
disclosure  of  power,  and  gives  an  epitome  of  theories  of 
the  Beautiful. 

It  is  to  be  noted,  in  reference  to  the  three  characteristics 
of  aesthetic  pleasure  mentioned  by  Mr.  Bain,  and  especially 
in  reference  to  the  third  of  them,  which  Aristotle  signalised 
so  well — viz.  its  disinterestedness,  or  its  being  sharable  by 
others — that  this  is  not  peculiar  to  aesthetic  pleasure.  It  is 
a  characteristic  of  all  intellectual  life,  of  scientific  knowledge, 
and  of  moral  as  well  as  of  aesthetic  pleasure. 


1 1 .   William  B.  Scott  to  Charles  Darwin 

The  nineteenth  of  William  B.  Scott's  Half-Hour  Lectures 
on  the  History  and  Practice  of  the  Fine  and  Ornamental 
Arts  (1861)  discusses  "Taste  and  Beauty."  It  has  special 


234  The  Philosophy  of  tl'ie  Beautiful          CHAP. 

merit,  as  an  artist's  discussion  of  Art.  He  deals  with  the 
common  charge  of  the  arbitrariness  of  taste  by  showing  that 
it  is  governed  by  law,  and  that  the  varieties  of  judgment 
are  due  to  difference  of  organisation.  In  considering  the 
elements  of  Beauty,  he  begins  with  harmony  of  parts  as 
"the  first  and  most  necessary  condition"  (p.  349),  all 
things  being  accordant,  and  a  unity  underlying  all  variety. 
The  second  condition  is  symmetry,  "  every  living  creature 
being  composed  of  two  halves,  each  the  exact  counterpart 
of  the  other"  (p.  251).  When  there  is  a  want  of  this 
symmetry,  it  is  because  Nature  has  been  thwarted  by  opposing 
forces,  by  some  disturbing  or  alien  element.  "  All  architect- 
ure is  the  triumph  of  symmetry."  It  is  "  not  reproduction 
or  imitation  of  Nature  ;  on  the  contrary,  it  overcomes  the 
law  of  gravitation  by  constructive  devices."  Scott  affirms 
that  the  good,  the  beautiful,  and  the  true  are  but  the  three 
forms  of  the  same  spirit ;  and  that  the  Beautiful  is  "  the 
appreciation  of  the  good  and  the  true  in  the  bodily  life  about 
us"  (p.  355). 

In  June  of  the  same  year  (1861),  W.  Barns,  author  of 
Poems  in  the  Dorsetshire  Dialect,  discussed  the  subject  of 
Beauty  and  Art  in  Macmillarfs  Magazine.  His  definition 
is  a  very  vague  one,  and  may  be  quoted  as  a  foil  to  the 
definitions  given  by  more  accurate  thinkers.  "  The  beautiful 
in  Nature  is  the  unmarred  result  of  God's  first  creative  or 
forming  will,  and  the  beautiful  in  Art  is  the  result  of  the 
unmistaken  working  of  man  in  accordance  with  the  beauti- 
ful in  Nature."  To  affirm  that  Beauty  is  the  outcome  of  a 
forming  will  defines  or  explains  nothing.  Mr.  Barns  goes 
on  to  identify  the  Beautiful  with  the  good  and  the  fit.  The 
beauty  of  colours  lies  in  their  fitness  or  harmony ;  and  it  is 
the  same  with  the  beauty  of  landscape.  In  discussing  the 
beautiful  in  Art,  he  quotes  a  Welsh  sentence  : — "  The  three 
main  necessities  for  a  man  of  awen  (artistic  genius)  are  an 
eye  to  see  Nature,  a  heart  to  feel  Nature,  and  boldness  to 
follow  Nature."  Barns  also  tries  to  show  how  the  study  of 
Art  gives  keener  insight  into  the  beauties  of  Nature. 

In  1865,  Miss  Frances  Power  Cobbe  contributed  a  very 
able  article  to  Eraser's  Magazine,  on  "the  Hierarchy  of 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  235 

Art,"  which  was  republished  in  her  Studies,  Ethical  and 
Social,  issued  in  the  same  year.  In  it  she  distinguishes 
three  orders  of  priesthood  "  in  the  sacred  service  of  the 
Beautiful" — (i)  the  primary,  or  creative  artists  :  the  poets, 
architects,  sculptors,  painters,  composers  of  music ;  (2)  the 
secondary,  or  reproductive  artists  :  the  dramatic  performers, 
translators,  copyists,  engravers,  performers  of  music  ;  and 
(3)  the  tertiary,  or  receptive  artists  :  the  dilettanti,  who 
merely  appreciate.  She  distinguishes  good  from  bad  art 
in  each  of  these  three  classes,  and  deals  with  them  in 
detail.  Her  remarks  on  the  primary  art  of  Poetry  are  ex- 
tremely good.  It  is  "the  first  of  the  arts,  in  right  of  its 
instrument,  its  scope,  and  its  durability.  ...  It  is  the 
medium  between  mind  and  nature.  It  is  the  logos  whose 
father  is  spiritual  and  whose  mother  is  corporeal.  .  .  .  The 
true  poet  sees  all  history  as  an  epic  Odyssey  of  our 
humanity.  To  him  creation  itself  is  a  divine  drama  of 
Prometheus  unbound.  .  .  .  The  poetry  of  Nature  and  the 
poetry  of  Art  alike  are  God's  revelations  of  the  Beautiful. 
.  .  .  It  is  by  revealing  Beauty  that  Art  fulfils  its  purpose." 
Professor  J.  F.  Seeley  contributed  a  very  interesting 
paper  on  the  Elementary  Principles  in  Art  to  Macmillarts 
Magazine  in  May  1867.  "Art,"  he  says,  "is  one  of  the 
natural  forms  which  are  assumed  by  joy  ;  what  we  call 
the  arts  are  really  different  ways  of  being  happy."  They 
fill  up  the  blank  spaces  of  our  lives,  and  save  us  from 
ennui ;  they  lift  us  to  higher  levels,  and  send  us  forward. 
Mr.  Seeley's  aim  is  to  show  that  there  are  laws  or  principles 
in  Art  and  to  determine  what  they  are.  He  seeks  for 
what  is  common  to  all  the  Arts,  and  adopts  Schiller's 
doctrine  that  all  Art  is  play  or  sport.  The  Muses  are  the 
daughters  of  joy.  But  while  all  art  is  play,  it  does  not 
follow  that  the  artist  is  simply  one  who  amuses  himself. 
He  is  the  dispenser  of  joy,  and  in  order  to  be  so  he  must 
be  young  in  spirit.  But  play  is  not  mirth.  There  is  a 
serious  element  in  it,  a  strenuous  intense  element  (as 
even  in  games  of  skill)  ;  but  it  has  itself  for  its  end,  not 
anything  beyond  itself.  "When  the  powers  of  man  are 
at  the  highest,  his  gambols  are  not  less  mighty  than  his 


236  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

labours."  All  Art  then  must  "in  its  total  effect  be  pleasur- 
able," and  it  is  only  after  use  has  been  satisfied,  that  its 
function  begins. 

The  different  Arts  answer  to  different  faculties,  but  in 
all  of  them,  delight  is  expressed  by  rhythm  or  proportion 
of  some  kind  ;  and  this  rhythm,  which  runs  through  our 
whole  existence,  and  without  which  life  would  be  comfort- 
less, is  the  principal  thing  in  Art.  It  is  present  in  painting, 
sculpture,  and  architecture,  no  less  than  in  poetry,  music, 
and  dancing.  Rhythm  is  regularity  in  Time  ;  and  regularity 
in  Space  is  Form.  This  gives  us  the  first  principle  in  Art ; 
but  added  to  it  there  must  be  imitation.  This  is  the  second 
of  the  two  primary  principles.  It  is  imitation  which  is 
the  passive  principle  in  Art,  that  gives  to  it  its  boundless 
range  ;  whereas  the  other  (rhythm  or  proportion)  is  the 
active  shaping  principle.  By  the  one  we  find  what  exists 
in  Nature,  and  reproduce  it ;  by  the  other  we  give  a  new 
interpretation  to  what  we  find. 

In  another  Review,  the  Fortnightly,  for  June  1871,  Mr. 
Edward  J.  Poynter  published  a  lecture  delivered  at  Man- 
chester in  the  winter  of  the  same  year,  on  "  Beauty  and 
Realism  "  in  construction  and  decoration.  According  to  Mr. 
Poynter,  "  the  qualities  of  mind  required  to  produce  a  work 
of  Art  are  two — viz.  the  power  of  Design,  and  the  power  of 
Imitation.  The  power  of  Design,  again,  is  of  two  kinds, 
Constructive  and  Ornamental.  .  .  .  Amongst  uncivilised 
peoples,  the  art  of  design,  both  ornamental  and  con- 
structive, is  generally  far  in  advance  of  that  of  imitation.  .  .  . 
If  we  examine  the  elements  of  Beauty  in  constructive  design 
we  find  that  two  things  are  essential — first,  fitness  for  the 
purpose  which  the  object  is  intended  to  fulfil ;  and  second, 
good  workmanship  in  making  it." 

As  to  Beauty  in  constructive  design,  if  colour,  form,  and 
workmanship  be  attended  to,  Nature  may  be  freely  imitated. 
In  ornamental  design,  the  imitation  of  Nature  is  a  principal 
aim  ;  and  "  truth  to  Nature  is  the  most  important  necessity 
in  any  kind  of  work  which  professes  to  imitate  Nature." 
But  Mr.  Poynter  thinks  that  the  distinction  between 
Realism  and  Idealism  is  often  far  too  sharply  drawn. 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  237 

They  should  not  be  set  in  opposition  to  one  another.  It  is 
difficult  for  every  one,  and  impossible  for  the  untrained,  to 
decide  as  to  what  is  true  to  Nature,  and  what  is  not. 
Any  one  can  see  the  broad  external  facts  of  Nature,  but  a 
lifetime  of  observation  is  required  to  see  its  deeper  truths, 
and  to  reproduce  them  in  Art.  Mr.  Poynter's  remarks  on 
High  Art,  on  the  grand  style,  on  technique,  and  on  manner- 
ism in  Art,  are  all  admirable.  The  essay  is  an  excellent 
defence  of  realism  in  Art  in  its  profounder  aspects,  but  it  is 
such  a  realism  as  leads  to  and  involves  the  ideal.  Mr. 
Poynter's  appreciation  of  Michael  Angelo  as  the  greatest  of 
the  realists,  is  excellent. 

Ten  Lectures  on  Art,  by  the  same  author,  published  in 
1879,  are  on  Decorative  Art,  systems  of  art  education, 
objects  of  art  study,  the  study  of  Nature,  and  other  topics. 
In  the  lecture  on  Decorative  Art  he  affirms  that  "an 
essential  element  of  beauty  in  the  art  of  Painting  is  realism" 
(p.  34).  But  as  tastes  differ,  he  asks  if  there  can  be  a 
standard  of  the  Beautiful,  and  in  reply  he  affirms  (i)  his 
distinct  consciousness  of  the  beauty  of  certain  things  (such 
as  a  lily  or  a  rose),  and  the  ugliness  of  others  (e.g.  a 
toad).  (2)  Differences  in  taste,  artificial  estimates  of  the 
Beautiful,  do  not  warrant  the  conclusion  that  there  is  no 
external  standard  of  Beauty.  While  "truth  of  Nature  is 
the  most  important  necessity  in  any  work  which  professes 
to  imitate  Nature"  (p.  37),  too  much  distinction  has  been 
made  between  the  ideal  and  the  real,  between  the  imitation 
of  Nature  and  its  idealisation.  "The  highest  beauty  is 
attained  by  the  highest  application  of  the  realistic  or 
imitative  faculty"  (p.  39).  But  what  is  it  to  be  true  to 
Nature  ?  Realism  gives  the  "  highest  form  of  Beauty"  only 
if  we  "  search  through  Nature  for  the  most  beautiful  forms 
and  the  loftiest  characteristics"  (p.  43),  as  Raphael  and 
Michael  Angelo  did.  The  Greek  artists  of  the  Parthenon 
"have  the  supreme  right  to  the  title  of  idealists." 
Michael  Angelo,  on  the  other  hand,  was,  according  to  Mr. 
Poynter,  "the  greatest  realist  the  world  has  ever  seen" 
(p.  51).  He  considers  Michael  Angelo  the  supreme 
master  in  the  world  of  Art,  both  in  grandeur  of  form, 


238  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

and  expression  ;  and  his  idealism  was  only  a  higher  form 
of  realism.  He  opposes  Mr.  Ruskin's  view  of  Angelo  and 
Raphael,  and  his  doctrine  that  the  perception  of  some 
moral  quality  in  Beauty  is  essential  to  the  production  of  a 
great  work  of  Art.  He  holds  that  "  the  moral  nature  of 
beauty  cannot  be  expressed  in  painting  or  sculpture."  The 
beauty  must  be  expressed  in  the  work  of  Art  itself,  "  and 
not  merely  exist  in  the  mind  of  the  artist  or  be  supplied  by 
that  of  the  beholder."  Mr.  Poynter's  book  is  slightly  dis- 
figured by  the  bitterness  of  its  attack  on  Mr.  Ruskin,  and 
its  excessive  eulogy  of  Michael  Angelo  as  "  on  the  solitary 
mountain  height,  where  he  reigns  apart  from  and  above 
other  mortals"  (p.  241),  but  is  full  of  the  most  valuable 
art-criticism. 

In  Charles  Darwin's  Descent  of  Man  (1871)  the  sense  of 
Beauty  is  repeatedly  discussed.  The  author  of  The  Origin 
of  Species  thinks  that  it  is  not  a  sense  peculiar  to  man. 
Birds  ornament  their  nests,  and  appreciate  brilliant  colours 
in  their  mates  ;  while  some  animals  seem  to  have  a  greater 
sense  of  Beauty  than  some  men  (vol.  i.  pp.  63,  64). 
Although  it  is  difficult  to  distinguish  between  what  is  merely 
curiosity  in  them,  and  what  is  admiration,  there  is  no  doubt 
that  the  Australian  bower-bird  possesses  the  sense  of  Beauty 
(vol.  ii.  p.  112).  Darwin  gives  a  high  place  to  the 
"  influence  of  Beauty  in  determining  the  marriages  of 
mankind."  The  love  of  ornament  is  native  to  man,  and 
primitive  art  is  decorative.  He  enlarges  very  much  on  the 
diversities  of  taste  as  to  Beauty  amongst  savages,  and  ends 
his  discussion  of  the  "  sexual  characters  of  man,"  in  his  nine- 
teenth chapter,  with  the  profound  remark  that  "characters 
of  all  kinds  may  easily  be  too  much  developed  for  beauty. 
Hence  a  perfect  Beauty,  which  implies  many  characters 
modified  in  a  particular  manner,  will  in  every  race  be  a 
prodigy.  As  the  great  anatomist  Bichat  long  ago  said,  if 
every  one  were  cast  in  the  same  mould,  there  would  be  no 
such  thing  as  beauty.  If  all  our  women  were  to  become  as 
beautiful  as  the  Venus  de  Medici,  we  should  for  a  time  be 
charmed  ;  but  we  should  soon  wish  for  variety  ;  and  as  soon 
as  we  had  obtained  variety,  we  should  wish  to  see  certain 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  239 

characters  in  our  women  a  little  exaggerated  beyond  the 
then  existing  common  standard"  (vol.  ii.  p.  354). 


12.  Herbert  Spencer  to  Mr.  Sully 

In  the  second  edition  of  his  Principles  of  Psychology, 
Ft.  VIII.  ch.  xi.  (1872),  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer  discusses 
the  "  ^Esthetic  sentiments  " ;  and  in  his  Essays,  Scientific, 
Political,  and  Speculative  (1868),  there  are  several  papers 
on  aesthetic  questions,  e.g.  "  Use  and  Beauty,"  "  Sources  of 
Architectural  Types,"  "  Personal  Beauty,"  "  Gracefulness," 
"  The  Origin  and  Function  of  Music."  In  a  chapter  of  his 
Principles,  on  "^Esthetic  sentiment,"  Mr.  Spencer  adopts 
Schiller's  theory  of  the  play-impulse.  He  separates  the 
utilities  which  conduce  to  life,  from  those  which  conduce 
to  enjoyment.  The  energy  of  all  creatures  inferior  to 
man  is  spent  in  life-maintenance  and  race-maintenance ; 
but,  in  the  human  race,  where  these  energies  are  satisfied, 
there  is  leisure  for  something  more.  Nevertheless  it  is 
the  old  energy  finding  a  new  outlet.  Play  of  all  kinds  is 
the  "  superfluous  and  useless  energy  of  the  faculties  that 
have  been  quiescent"  (p.  630).  The  "useless  activity  of 
unsound  organs "  is  play.  Play  is  "  simulated  actions  in 
place  of  real  actions."  From  the  sport  of  kittens,  or 
children,  or  boys,  up  to  the  playful  conversation  of  adults 
in  a  wit-combat,  it  is  the  same.  The  impulse  is  carried 
on  for  the  sake  of  pleasure,  not  for  any  lower  utility.  If 
a  feeling  has  any  aesthetic  character,  it  has  no  "  life-serving 
function."  Sensations  of  taste,  which  are  useful,  have  no 
aesthetic  character.  What  reaches  us  through  the  eye  and 
ear,  having  less  of  a  life-serving  function,  has  more  aesthetic 
character.  Passing  from  sensation  to  sentiment,  the  love 
of  possession  has  no  aesthetic  character.  A  rich  man  is 
not  an  object  of  the  aesthetic  sense.  But  a  man  who 
shows  prowess,  or  excels  in  a  deed  of  daring,  is.  That  the 
object  matter  of  the  aesthetic  feelings  is  things  in  them- 
selves, not  their  uses,  is  further  seen  from  the  fact  that  many 
of  them  tend  out  to  other  people.  What  "brings  the 


240  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

sensory  apparatus  into  the  most  effectual  unimpeded  action  " 
(p.  636)  is  the  origin  of  Beauty,  as  regards  that  sense, 
especially  in  regard  to  the  eye  and  ear.  He  admits  the 
very  great  influence  of  association  in  helping  the  primary 
physical  element,  which  is  the  source  of  beauty. 

The  primary  source  of  aesthetic  pleasure  is  that  element 
or  quality  in  an  object  "  which  exercises  the  faculties  affected 
in  the  most  complete  ways,  with  the  fewest  drawbacks  from 
excess  of  exercise "  (p.  638).  A  secondary  source  is  the 
"  difference  of  a  stimulus  in  large  amount,  which  awakens 
a  glow  of  agreeable  feeling";  and  a  third  is  the  partial 
revival  of  the  same,  with  special  combinations.  A  hierarchy, 
or  scale  of  aesthetic  pleasures,  is  given  us  thus — (i)  the 
pleasure  of  simple  sensation,  odours,  colours,  sounds  ;  (2) 
the  pleasure  which  arises  from  a  perception  of  the  com- 
bination of  lights  and  shades,  colours,  cadences,  and  chords, 
and  more  especially  in  "  structures  of  melody  and  harmony  " ; 
(3)  the  pleasure  which  results  when  sensation  and  percep- 
tion combine,  and  the  representative  element  is  predominant, 
and  high  emotion  results.  The  highest  state  is  that  in 
which  all  of  these  conjoin  and  co-operate.  The  aesthetic 
emotions  are  not  different,  "  in  origin  or  nature,"  from  any 
others.  They  are  only  "  particular  modes  of  excitement  of 
our  faculties."  They  differ  from  our  non-aesthetic  sensations 
perceptions  and  emotions,  which  are  transitory,  in  that  they 
are  "kept  in  consciousness,  and  dwelt  upon"  (p.  647). 

In  his  essay  on  Personal  Beauty,  Mr.  Spencer  makes 
the  suggestive  remark  that  "  Expression  is  feature  in  the 
making." 

The  Theory  of  the  Beautiful,  a  Saturday  lecture 
delivered  at  Trinity  College,  Dublin,  by  John  Todhunter, 
M.D.,  Professor  of  English  Literature,  Alexandra  College, 
Dublin  (1872),  is  a  specially  valuable  essay,  and  one  of  the 
most  condensed  in  our  literature.  It  is  a  defence  of  the 
transcendental  idealism  of  Plato,  Schelling,  and  Hegel,  with 
Jouffroy's  Cours  cPEsthetique  as  his  "guide-book."  The 
Beautiful  is  defined  as  the  infinite  loveliness  which  we 
apprehend  both  by  reason  and  by  "  the  pure  enthusiasm  of 
love,"  "  knowing  and  feeling  being  necessary  to  each  other, 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  -  241 

and  simultaneous"  (p.  5).  To  a  certain  extent  each  man 
has  his  own  canons  of  .taste,  and  there  is  no  recognised 
infallible  authority  to  which  we  can  refer  for  guidance" 
(p.  9)  ;  but  it  is  the  same  with  our  ethical  judgments.  In 
both,  however,  there  is  "an  approach  to  unanimity,"  and 
the  more  cultivated  men  are,  the  more  they  agree  as  to 
Beauty.  The  variability  in  taste  depends  on  us,  and  on 
defects  in  us,  not  upon  the  Beautiful  itself. 

Dr.  Todhunter  discusses  (ist)  the  characteristics  of 
objects  in  which  Beauty  exists,  and  (2d)  the  effects  pro- 
duced in  us  by  them.  He  reduces  the  miscellaneous  mass 
of  beautiful  things  to  two  categories — (i)  beauty  of  form 
and  colour,  and  (2)  beauty  of  rhythm  and  sound.  He 
asks  if  we  can  abstract  form  from  colour  and  rhythm  from 
sound,  and  a  beauty  remain  in  each  of  them.  He  main- 
tains that  there  is  a  beauty  of  pure  form  apart  from  colour, 
and  a  beauty  of  pure  sound  apart  from  rhythm.  A  design 
drawn  on  a  white  ground  with  black  ink,  a  bit  of  blue  sky, 
silent  symmetrical  movement  seen  at  a  distance,  and  a 
single  pure  note  of  an  instrument  are  cases  in  point.  But 
he  goes  on  to  affirm,  with  some  contradiction,  that  there  is  a 
form  inseparable  from  colour,  and  a  rhythm  which  reveals 
itself  in  hue.  Form  and  rhythm  respectively  divide  space 
and  time  ;  they  also  measure  them.  Form  is  a  statical 
idea,  and  expresses  molecular  rest ;  rhythm  is  a  dynamical 
idea,  and  expresses  molecular  motion.  All  form  and  all 
rhythm  are  not  beautiful ;  the  form  must  be  symmetrical, 
and  the  rhythm  must  be  harmonious.  Dr.  Todhunter 
makes  some  acute  remarks  on  the  relation  of  the  seven 
colours  of  the  spectrum  to  the  seven  notes  of  the  musical 
scale.  He  finds  that  Order  and  Proportion  are  conditions 
of  the  Beautiful — Order  being  Symmetry  (or  the  interdepend- 
ence of  parts  by  which  each  contributes  to  the  perfection  of 
the  whole)  ;  and  Proportion  being  Harmony  (or  the  inter- 
dependence of  parts  which  most  satisfies  the  mind)  ;  and 
both  together  resulting  enabling  the  objects  that  possess 
them  to  fulfil  their  function  in  the  universe.  Every  object 
that  has  beauty  has  also  expression.  A  poem,  a  piece  of 
music,  a  statue,  a  beautiful  face,  "  all  bring  us  into  contact 

R 


242  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

with  other  minds  besides  our  own'.3  (p.  16).  But  "the 
sunset  and  the  landscape  do  not  express  the  human  mind." 
.  .  .  "What,"  he  asks,  "if  the  beauty  itself  be  the 
expression  of  something  behind  this  material  world,  some 
character  of  that  Invisible  of  which  the  visible  is  the  reve- 
lation ?"  (p.  17). 

Passing  to  a  consideration  of  the  effects  produced  in  us 
by  objects  that  are  beautiful,  he  says  they  may  be  all 
summed  up  in  the  one  word  "joy."  But  joy  and  pleasure 
are  different  things,  and  all  that  gives  pleasure  is  not 
beautiful.  Pleasures  are  either  interested  or  disinterested. 
The  things  that  give  us  interested  pleasure  are  not  beautiful, 
although  the  same  thing  may  be  both  beautiful  and  useful. 
The  use  and  the  beauty  are  not  the  same,  else  they  would 
always  coexist,  and  would  increase  and  diminish  together. 
But  we  have  disinterested  pleasures  which  are  purely  sympa- 
thetic, and  which  take  us  out  of  ourselves  altogether.  The 
emotion  of  the  beautiful  is  one  of  them.  It  is  not  only  dis- 
interested, it  has  in  it  an  element  of  worship.  We  revere 
it,  and  yet  we  long  to  be  absorbed  into  it.  There  is  more 
than  sympathy  in  the  emotion  of  the  beautiful.  Sympathy 
unites  similar  personalities,  but  love  unites  dissimilar  ones. 
Transcending  experience,  it  carries  us  into  the  region  of  the 
unknown.  It  is  "a  rapture  of  love,  like  that  of  Endymion 
for  his  goddess,  of  a  mortal  for  an  immortal,  who  perpetu- 
ally melts  from  his  embrace  "  (p.  20). 

In  his  concluding  section  Dr.  Todhunter  asks  what  this 
is  intrinsically  "  which  speaks  to  us  through  forms,  colours, 
sounds  ?  and  what  does  it  say  to  us  ?  "  He  answers  that  it 
is  not  something  merely  pleasant  to  the  senses,  or  interest- 
ing to  the  intellect,  or  delightful  to  the  emotions,  it  is 
"  something  that  we  instinctively  recognise  as  good  and 
right  in  and  for  itself."  It  is  the  "  revelation  of  a  more 
perfect  order  of  things,"  "  no  product  of  blind  forces,  but 
of  forces  working  intelligently,  and  with  mutual  helpfulness 
towards  a  definite  end."  Through  it  we  pass  beyond  our- 
selves to  the  Divine.  But  it  is  a  double  revelation.  Beauty 
also  reveals  ugliness  ;  the  cosmos  discloses  its  opposite,  a 
chaos  ;  and  "  the  mystery  of  Harmony  is  that  its  perfection 


xii  'The  Philosophy  of  Britain  243 

consists  in  its  being  imperfect.  It  proceeds  by  the  endless 
resolution  of  discord.  There  is  always  a  remnant  of  dis- 
cord to  be  removed,  and  this  suggests  higher  harmonies  " 
(pp.  22,  23).  "The  essence  of  Harmony  is  that  it  unites 
dissimilar  elements,  so  that  by  the  very  clashing  of  their 
natures  they  enhance  each  other's  perfection.  .  .  .  Beauty 
is,  in  fact,  the  reconciliation  of  contradictions,  a  Hegelian 
identity  of  opposites"  (p.  23).  Further,  it  is  a  progressive 
idea.  "  It  must  include  more  and  more  in  its  signification, 
as  our  knowledge  of  the  mysteries  of  the  universe  becomes 
more  profound"  (p.  25). 

The  last  essay  in  Mr.  James  Sully's  Sensation  and  Intui- 
tion; Studies  in  Psychology  and  ^Esthetics  (1874),  is  "On 
the  possibility  of  a  science  of  ^Esthetics."  Essays  7,  8, 
and  9  are  on  the  basis  of  musical  sensation,  the  aspects 
of  Beauty  in  Musical  Form,  and  the  nature  and  limits  of 
musical  experience;  while  Essays  10  and  n  discuss  the 
aesthetic  aspects  of  Character,  and  the  representation  of 
character  in  Art. 

Mr.  Sully  is  a  representative  English  writer  on  the  sub- 
ject of  aesthetics,  and  no  one  has  done  better  service  to  the 
school  which  he  champions,  although  many  will  dispute  the 
conclusions  at  which  he  arrives. 

He  affirms — with  notable  catholicity — that  no  one  prin- 
ciple of  ./Esthetics  has  absolute  validity,  but  that  relative 
validity  is  all  we  need,  alike  in  Ethics  and  ^Esthetics. 
He  provisionally  defines  the  essence  of  Art  as  "  the  produc- 
tion of  some  permanent  object,  or  passing  action,  which  is 
fitted  not  only  to  supply  an  active  enjoyment  to  the  pro- 
ducer, but  to  convey  a  pleasurable  impression  to  a  number 
of  spectators  or  listeners,  quite  apart  from  any  personal 
advantage  to  be  derived  from  it."  He  thinks  (and  here 
many  will  disagree  with  him)  that  the  labours  of  meta- 
physicians to  discover  the  source  of  Beauty  are  of  no  use 
towards  a  science  of  Art,  because  the  properties  of  Art  "  are 
innumerable,  and  can  only  be  subsumed  under  some  such 
conception  as  pleasurability."  Its  essence  is  to  "gratify 
certain  emotional  susceptibilities."  "Art,  in  its  first  and 
simplest  aspect,  is  a  mere  variation  and  expansion  of 


244  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

pleasures  imparted  to  the  eye  and  ear  by  nature."  He 
refers  to  the  labours  of  Alison,  Bain,  and  Spencer  in  classify- 
ing pleasures,  and  then  gives  what  he  regards  as  a  more 
complete  system  of  aesthetic  pleasure — (i)  Primary  plea- 
sures of  stimulation,  due  to  single  organic  impressions; 
(2)  secondary  ones,  due  to  a  plurality  of  impressions;  (3) 
ideal  revivals  of  these,  when  the  idea  is  one  of  immediate 
inference  ;  (4)  pleasures  of  ideal  recollection  ;  (5)  pleasures 
of  intuition  ;  (6)  pleasures  of  imagination. 

In  discussing  these  pleasures  we  get  "  the  first  dimen- 
sion in  the  aesthetic  measure,  viz.  extension."  It  will  be 
noted  that,  in  pointing  out  what  falls  to  be  discussed  under 
some  of  these  heads,  Mr.  Sully  takes  up  the  despised 
metaphysical  problem.  The  important  result,  however,  is 
that  we  reach  "certain  approximately  universal  laws  of 
pleasurable  impression "  ;  e.g.  it  is  possible  to  define  the 
organic  conditions  of  pleasure  in  sound  and  in  colour ; 
further,  a  variation  of  the  elements  of  sensation  and  emotion 
is  always  necessary  for  clearness  and  intensity  of  conscious- 
ness ;  and,  in  addition,  feeling,  once  excited,  tends  to  persist. 
These  are  "  constant  laws  of  aesthetic  enjoyment,"  and  every 
work  of  Art  must  conform  to  them.  So  much  for  "  the 
dimension  of  extension." 

But  in  addition  to  this,  Art  demands,  in  the  next  place, 
"a  dimension  of  intention,  or  degree";  and  this  Mr.  Sully 
finds  (i)  in  the  utilitarian  rule  of  the  greatest  happiness  of 
the  greatest  number.  He  would  measure  the  value  of  an 
aesthetic  pleasure  on  the  one  hand,  and  of  a  work  of  Art  on 
the  other,  by  their  respective  universality  and  permanence. 

(2)  Some  aesthetic  pleasures  are,  in  their  nature,  purer,  more 
durable,  and  more  easily  recovered  than  others  are ;  and 
therefore  a  work  of  Art  is  higher  than  others  according  as 
it  affords  a  purer  pleasure  to  "atypical  aesthetic  nature." 

(3)  If  the  first  condition  seems  too  concrete,  and  the  second 
too  abstract,  a  third  lies  midway  between  them.     It  seeks  to 
separate  what  is  "  large  and  abiding  "  in  aesthetic  tendency, 
from  what  is  "  variable  and  transient "  ;  thus  giving  a  con- 
crete basis  to  the  aesthetic  ideal  and  to  Art. 

Hence  the  importance  of  a   study  of  the  development 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  245 

of  the  aesthetic  tendencies  of  the  race,  as  seen  in  the 
history  of  Art.  Mr.  Sully  finds  that  there  has  been  a  pro- 
gressive growth  in  the  number  of  aesthetic  pleasures,  and  in 
their  variety  ;  and,  in  comparing  the  lower  stages  with  the 
higher  ones,  there  is  "an  immense  increase  in  the  quantity 
of  pure  enjoyment." 

What,  however,  are  the  essential  features  of  the  pro- 
gress ?  Slightly  modifying  Mr.  Spencer's  classification,  Mr. 
Sully  holds  that  our  aesthetic  feelings  become  more  refined, 
intense,  and  frequent,  (i)  according  as  we  discriminate 
things  more  accurately  and  assimilate  them  more  rapidly, 
and  (2)  according  as  our  powers  of  retention  and  reproduc- 
tion increase.  For  example,  the  distinction  of  shades  of 
colour,  and  of  sound,  open  up — to  the  artist's  eye  and  to 
the  musician's  ear — pleasures  of  which  others  have  no  con- 
ception. Hidden  sources  of  pleasure  are  thus  discerned  ; 
while  the  power  of  retaining,  and  of  rapidly  reproducing  old 
experiences,  or  of  bringing  former  pleasures  again  on  the 
stage  by  vividness  or  alertness  of  faculty,  is  a  new  source 
of  pleasure.  Signs  that  awaken  no  feeling  to  the  ordinary 
mind,  suggest  a  train  of  ideas  to  the  cultivated  eye,  and 
widen  the  area  of  pleasure.  Therefore,  according  to  the 
refinement  and  the  complexity  of  pleasures,  they  may  be 
arranged  in  an  ascending  scale,  and  the  higher  pleasures 
are  not  only  more  permanent,  but  they  tend  to  recur  more 
frequently. 

Mr.  Sully  gives  his  final  definition  of  aesthetics  in  these 
terms  : — "  A  work  is  aesthetic  which,  through  impressions  of 
the  eye  or  of  the  ear,  satisfies  some  pleasurable  suscepti- 
bility, and  satisfies  some  universal  law  of  pleasurable 
impression  ;  highly  artistic,  when  it  affords  a  large  number 
of  such  pleasurable  impressions  ;  further,  when  these  feel- 
ings are  either  permanent  emotional  needs  of  the  human 
heart,  or  refined  and  complex  products  of  mental  develop- 
ment." He  subsequently  deals  with  what  he  regards  as 
"  the  second  branch  of  aesthetics,"  viz.  artistic  effect. 

Mr.  Sully  has  also  discussed  the  subject,  on  similar  lines, 
in  his  Outlines  of  Psychology  (1884),  in  numerous  essays  in 
Mind — especially  one  on  "The  Harmony  of  Colours" 


246  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

(April  1879) — and  in  his  article  on  "Esthetics"  in  the 
Encyclopedia  Britannica.  In  the  latter  he  gives  an  excel- 
lent summary  of  the  history  of  opinion,  so  far  as  it  goes. 
Mr.  Sully  naturally  emphasises  the  views  of  writers  to 
which  a  representative  of  the  opposite  school  will  attach 
little  importance,  and  he  omits  the  names  of  many 
authors  whose  writings  seem  of  great  value  to  idealists. 
He  has,  however,  done  nothing  so  complete  as  the 
thirteenth  essay  of  his  Sensation  and  Intttition  (1824). 

Some  will  doubtless  feel,  after  the  most  careful  perusal 
of  his  book,  that  his  elaborate  tracing  of  the  source  of 
pleasure,  his  analytic  study  of  the  separate  strands  of  sensa- 
tion, emotion,  imagination,  and  thought — all  of  which  enter 
into  our  complex  enjoyment  of  the  Beautiful — is  outside  the 
main  problem  of  aesthetics.  It  is  extremely  interesting  as 
a  psychological  analysis,  but  a  series  of  measurements  of 
pleasure  is  not  the  whole  even  of  aesthetic  Science  ;  while 
the  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful  essays  something  very 
different.  The  outcome  of  his  teaching  is  hostile  to  any 
standard  of  Beauty.  Beauty  is  not  an  intrinsic  quality  of 
objects.  The  harmony  of  the  pleasures  of  sense,  intellect, 
and  feeling  is  all  that  we  are  conscious  of;  and  the  whole 
effect  of  Beauty  comes  to  be  the  pressure  on  us  of  "  a  mass 
of  pleasurable  stimulus  for  sense,  intellect,  and  emotion." 


13.  Canon  M 02 ley  to  Mr.  Grant  Allen 

In  Professor  J.  B.  Mozley's  Ser?nons  preached  before  the 
University  of  Oxford,  published  in  1876,  there  is  one  on 
"  Nature "  which  contains  a  distinct  contribution  to  the 
Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful.  "  Nature,"  says  Dr.  Mozley, 
"has  two  great  revelations — that  of  Use,  and  that  of 
Beauty  ;  and  the  first  thing  we  observe  about  these  two 
characteristics  is  that  they  are  bound  together,  and  tied  to 
each  other.  .  .  .  But,  united  in  their  source,  in  themselves 
they  are  totally  separate."  The  laws  of  Nature  throw  off 
Beauty.  He  observes  that  a  new  passion  for  scenery,  and 
for  natural  beauty,  has  sprung  up  in  our  time  and  pene- 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  247 

trated  to  the  masses  of  society.  This  has  given  rise  to  a 
new  and  vast  fabric  of  poetical  language,  in  which  Nature 
is  regarded,  not  as  useful,  but  as  pictorial.  Yet  the  two 
are  one,  and  the  picture  is  as  immediate  a  vision  of  the 
Divine  as  the  utilities  of  Nature  are.  Beauty  in  Nature  is 
an  extra,  which  baffles  the  materialist.  "  Physical  science 
goes  back  and  back  into  Nature  "  ;  but  here,  on  "  the  front 
of  Nature,"  not  in  its  interior  recesses,  lies  a  raiment  of 
Beauty,  "  the  garment  we  see  Him  by."  Beauty  in  Nature 
is  the  visible  disclosure  of  Reason  ;  and  while  a  study  of 
the  phenomena  of  Nature  discloses  their  multitudinous  uses, 
these  phenomena  do  not  explain  the  beauty  that  is  in  it. 
"  The  glory  of  Nature,"  says  Mr.  Mozley,  "  resides  in  the 
mind  of  man  ;  there  is  an  inward  intervening  light  through 
which  the  material  objects  pass  ;  a  transforming  medium 
which  converts  the  physical  assemblage  into  a  picture." 
These  material  objects  are  transformed  by  the  light  which 
comes  from  within  the  percipient.  "  Nature  is  partly  a 
veil,  and  partly  a  revelation."  Mr.  Mozley  unites  this  semi- 
Berkeleyan  doctrine  with  a  more  explicit  Platonism.  All 
Nature  is  symbolic  of  man.  We  cannot  describe  Nature 
without  the  help  of  terms  that  are  human,  although  we 
cannot  tell  how  it  is  that  material  things  are  emblematical 
of  man.  Nature  inspires  us  both  with  awe  and  with  a 
sense  of  greatness  and  glory.  How  ?  Because  it  utters  a 
language,  which  speaks  to  us  of  the  Divine,  and  because 
its  dumb  hieroglyphics  "surpass  its  speech."  Nature  is 
full  of  enigmas,  but  its  spirit  addresses  us  through  symbols, 
and  "  creates  in  Nature  a  universal  language  about  itself." 

Canon  Mozley  has  endeavoured  to  broaden  the  basis  of 
Natural  Theology  by  taking  in  more  than  the  teleological 
view  of  adjustment,  and  by  arguing  directly  from  the  Beauty 
that  exists  in  the  world  to  a  Source  that  is  infinitely 
beautiful. 

In  his  Natural  Theology  of  Natural  Beauty ',  Mr.  St. 
John  Tyrwhitt  has  amplified  the  teaching  of  Mr.  Mozley. 
He  adopts  the  physical  explanation  of  the  origin  of  a 
sense  of  beauty  ;  and,  while  he  does  not  think  it  proved 
that  birds  have  been  guided  in  choosing  their  mates  by  the 


248  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

selection  of  the  most  brilliant  colours,  or  bees  by  selecting 
the  brightest  flower,  he  says  that  if  it  were  so,  it  "would 
only  prove  that  Beauty  was  a  rule  of  natural  selection." 
We  cannot  bring  man  into  the  category  of  the  lower  animals, 
"  whether  we  level  upwards  or  downwards,"  until  "a  dog 
or  an  elephant  can  be  shown  to  be  affected  by  the  colours 
of  sunrise  and  sunset,  or  by  a  starry  night"  (p.  23).  He 
regards  the  sense  of  Beauty  in  man  as  "a  spiritual  supple- 
ment to  the  sense  of  sight"  (p.  24).  If  Beauty  be  objective 
and  subjective,  objective  Beauty  is  the  "  power  with  which 
natural  objects  are  endowed,"  subjective  beauty  includes 
"  our  ideas  of  Beauty,  with  the  whole  field  of  art "  (p.  27). 

Mr.  Tyrwhitt's  historical  section  is  meagre  and  rhetori- 
cal, but  his  chapter  entitled  "  Design  within,  and  Beauty 
without "  is  much  better,  and  his  remarks  on  Turner  and 
Ruskin  are  the  best  in  his  book.  His  argument  is  that 
the  visible  and  natural  discloses  the  invisible  and  super- 
natural;  and  that  this  is  done  by  the  disclosure  (i)  of 
mind,  as  seen  in  structural  design,  and  (2)  of  Beauty,  as 
seen  in  form  and  colour. 

In  Thoughts  on  Art,  Philosophy,  and  Religion,  by 
Sydney  Dobell,  published  posthumously  in  1876,  there  is 
a  chapter  on  "  Beauty,  Love,  Order,  Unity."  Beauty  is 
defined  as  "  the  harmony  of  rhythmic  parts."  Its  "  primary 
principles  are  order  and  unity.  But  it  is  not  enough  for 
Beauty  that  it  embody  the  primary  principles.  .  .  .  When 
an  object,  having  order  and  unity,  has  variety  and  a  grada- 
tion of  change  that  can  be  perceived  without  violent  action," 
the  result  is  beauty.  There  is  much,  however,  that  is  fanci- 
ful in  the  detached  thoughts  of  Dobell. 

The  Fine  Arts,  and  their  Uses,  by  Mr.  William  Bellars, 
1876.  In  this  book  are  discussed — (i)  "Principles,"  (2) 
what  are  called  "the  fugitive  Arts,"  (3)  "the  permanent  Arts," 
and  (4)  "  the  subsidiary  Arts."  The  first  section  deals  with 
Beauty  and  Sublimity.  The  discussion  is  too  rhetorical, 
and  the  classification  of  theories  of  Beauty  as  those  which 
"make  Taste  a  matter  of  the  intellectual,  the  physical,  and 
the  moral  nature"  (p.  53),  is  not  a  happy  one.  "The 
essence  of  Beauty  would  seem  to  lie  in  its  affecting  us  with 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  249 

pleasure,  immediately  and  intuitively.'3  This  may  be  a 
condition  of  our  recognising  it,  but  it  can  never  be  its 
"essence."  It  is  elsewhere  defined  as  "the  instinctive 
perception  of  goodness."  If  we  follow  the  Beauty  developed 
for  us  in  Nature,  we  cannot  go  wrong  ;  but  all  Nature  is 
not  beautiful ;  some  of  it  only  has  an  "  aesthetic  value " 
(p.  63).  It  is  by  comparing  one  of  Nature's  products  with 
others,  that  we  find  the  standard  of  Beauty ;  and  those 
things  in  Nature  which  are  not  useful  "are  sure  to  be 
beautiful."  Decay  in  Nature,  for  example,  is  beautiful.  "  If 
the  sense  of  Beauty  be  the  instinctive  perception  of  good- 
ness, that  of  sublimity  is  the  instinctive  perception  of  great- 
ness "  (p.  68),  the  recognition  of  superiority. 

In  the  same  year  (1876),  The  Witness  of  Art,  or  the 
Legend  of  Beauty,  by  Mr.  Wyke  Bayliss,  appeared.  The 
aim  of  this  book  is  conveyed  in  the  following  sentence  : — 
"The  language  of  Art  is  not  simply  a  dialect  through  which 
we  transmit  our  own  thoughts.  It  is  the  one  universal 
tongue,  which  has  never  been  confounded.  ...  It  is  the 
logos,  through  which  the  silence  of  Nature  speaks  to  us " 
(p.  15).  To  find  the  standard  of  Beauty,  we  must  look 
elsewhere  than  to  our  untaught  instincts  of  liking  and  dis- 
liking (p.  20).  The  book  contains  a  comparison  between 
the  Greek  and  the  mediaeval  artists  of  the  Beautiful.  The 
aim  of  Greek,  and  of  classic  Art  generally,  was  to  reach  the 
ideal,  "  the  passionless  splendour  of  ideal  beauty."  It  was 
cold;  it  had  no  expression  (p.  57);  "sorrow  and  pain 
were  excluded  from  it "  (p.  60).  While  the  Christendom  of 
the  early  centuries  had  no  art  at  all,  in  the  renaissance  Art 
we  find  the  glow  of  devotion,  and  the  suffering  of  Chris- 
tianity embodied.  "  Passionate  expression  "  is  the  dominant 
note  of  Christian  Art.  This  degenerated  in  the  later  schools  ; 
and,  as  a  reaction  from  it,  we  find  that  the  life  and  strength 
of  modern  Art  consists  in  its  direct  appeal  to  Nature,  where 
the  ideal  is  sought  in  the  manifold  and  varied  types  of  the 
natural  world. 

In  his  Physiological  ^Esthetics,  published  in  1877,  Mr. 
Grant  Allen  followed  in  the  track  opened  up  by  Mr.  Sully. 
His  book  is  an  attempt  to  reply  to  the  question  which 


250  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

Darwin  had  left  unanswered,  viz.  why  man  (and  the  lower 
animals)  prefer  certain  brilliant  colours  and  rhythmical 
sounds  to  others  that  are  not  brilliant  or  rhythmic.  His 
inquiry  might  either  be  called  a  psychological  or  a  physio- 
logical one,  because  he  tries  to  show  that  all  our  "aesthetic 
feelings  are  constant  subjective  counterparts  of  certain 
definite  nervous  states"  (p.  viii.) — a  proposition  which  no- 
body can  deny.  He  seems  to  think  that  his  "  not  being 
an  excessive  devotee  of  fine  art  in  any  form,"  is  a  qualifica- 
tion which  helps  him  in  his  psychological  analysis  ;  and  he 
thinks  he  has  solved  the  mysteries  of  the  problem  by 
proving  that  our  likings  and  dislikings  as  to  beauty  are 
"  the  necessary  result  of  natural  selection."  He  tries  to 
prove  "  the  purely  physical  origin  of  the  sense  of  beauty, 
and  its  relativity  to  our  nervous  organisation  "  (p.  2),  and 
this  with  the  view  of  dealing  in  the  same  way  "  with  the 
intellect  and  the  affections."  He  explicitly  announces  him- 
self as  a  follower  of  Messrs.  "  Spencer,  Bain,  and  Maudsley," 
and  informs  us  that  he  regards  the  aesthetic  feelings  as 
intermediate  links  between  the  bodily  senses  and  the  higher 
emotions,  all  of  which  he  proposes  to  "  affiliate  upon  a 
physiological  law  of  pleasure  and  pain." 

The  rock  on  which  his  theory  suffers  shipwreck  is  seen 
in  his  definition  of  aesthetic  pleasures  and  pains,  as  those 
"  which  result  from  the  contemplation  of  the  beautiful  or 
ugly  in  Art  or  Nature."  He  starts  by  taking  for  granted 
the  existence  of  what  he  at  once  tries  to  explain  away.  He 
begins  by  an  analysis  of  pleasure  and  pain  in  general.  All 
pain  is  due  to  waste,  or  the  arrested  action  of  sentient 
tissue.  All  pleasure  is  due  to  the  normal  action  of  tissue ; 
it  is  its  reflex.  But  the  differentia  of  aesthetic  pleasure  must 
be  found  out.  Mr.  Allen  distinguishes,  as  Mr.  Spencer  had 
done,  the  labour  that  is  spent  on  providing  for  our  physical 
wants — the  life-sustaining  and  life-giving  processes,  entered 
upon  for  a  definite  purpose,  from  those  activities  which  are 
entered  upon  "  merely  for  the  gratification  which  the 
activity  affords"  (p.  32).  The  latter  is  of  two  kinds — (i) 
the  play-impulse,  (2)  that  which  gives  rise  to  Art  and  to 
aesthetic  pleasure.  Both  have  pleasure  for  their  immediate 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  251 

end ;  but  the  first  is  active,  while  the  second  is  passive. 
When  we  actively  exercise  our  limbs  and  muscles  for  the 
sake  of  pleasure,  the  play-impulse  is  at  work ;  when  we 
passively  exercise  our  eyes  and  ears,  the  aesthetic  impulse 
is  at  work,  which  Mr.  Allen  defines  thus — "the  subjective 
concomitant  of  the  normal  amount  of  activity,  not  directly 
connected  with  life-serving  function,  in  the  peripheral  end- 
organs  of  the  cerebro-spinal  nervous  system  "  (p.  34). 

It  is  "  when  we  arrange  certain  colours,  or  musical  notes 
in  certain  orders,  expressly  for  the  pleasure  which  their 
perception  will  give  us,  that  we  call  the  result  Art"  (p.  37). 
But  Mr.  Allen  does  not  admit  that  there  is  anything  in- 
trinsic in  objects  which  calls  forth  this  aesthetic  pleasure. 
"  The  aesthetic  quality  of  objects  is  so  slight  that  it  requires 
the  exercise  of  attention  to  bring  it  definitely  into  con- 
sciousness." It  only  amounts  to  this,  that,  when  "  the 
sensational  wave  is  very  great,"  it  gets  the  better  of  the 
intellectual  wave,  and  "hence  arises  the  apparent  object- 
ivity of  Beauty  and  ugliness."  "  The  aesthetically  beautiful 
is  that  which  affords  the  maximum  of  stimulation  with  the 
minimum  of  fatigue  or  waste.  .  .  .  The  aesthetically  ugly 
is  that  which  fails  to  do  so"  (p.  39).  After  referring  to 
the  disinterested  character  of  all  aesthetic  feeling,  he  dis- 
cusses the  variety  of  tastes.  The  blind  and  the  deaf  are 
of  course  cut  off  from  certain  aesthetic  feelings  ;  so  are  the 
colour-blind.  Tastes  must  differ  with  differences  of  organ- 
isation ;  but  there  is  a  common  element  in  them  all,  with- 
out which  Art  "  would  be  impossible " —  a  major  unity 
within  the  minor  variety.  It  is  easy  to  explain  the 
variety  by  structural  peculiarities  in  physique.  Taste  too 
can  be  educated  ;  and  while  we  cannot  impose  a  standard 
on  any  one,  we  must  accept  as  a  relative  standard,  valid 
for  all,  "the  judgments  of  the  finest -nurtured  and  most 
discriminative"  (p.  48).  These  create  the  taste  of  the  next 
generation.  Minute  beauties,  which  are  overlooked  by 
the  uneducated,  are  noticed  by  the  trained  eye  and  ear  ; 
and  as  we  compare  our  own  judgments  as  to  beauty  with 
those  of  others,  our  standard  is  raised.  To  what,  for  ex- 
ample, is  the  appreciation  of  the  "great  masters"  in  Art 


252  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

due  ?  To  the  influence  and  association  of  an  ever- widening 
experience.  Passing  over  his  analysis  of  the  special  senses, 
and  what  he  ranks  as  the  "lower  senses" — touch,  hearing, 
and  sight — which  are  all  "of  unmistakably  bodily  origin," 
he  deals  next  with  those  which  are  "  ideal  or  mental,"  in 
order  to  see  if  these  can  be  brought  into  accordance  with 
his  main  principle.  He  finds  that,  when  gratification  is 
connected  with  our  own  personality,  the  pleasure  is  "too 
monopolist  to  reach  the  aesthetic  level ;  but  when  it  is  un- 
connected in  thought  with  our  own  personality,  it  becomes 
a  subject  of  aesthetic  employment"  (p.  211).  It  is  thus 
that  he  explains  the  origin  of  the  sister  arts  of  poetry  and 
painting. 

Two  years  after  the  publication  of  his  Physiological 
^Esthetics,  in  1879,  Mr.  Allen  issued,  in  what  he  called 
'"An  Essay  on  Comparative  Psychology,"  some  of  the 
materials  which  he  had  collected  for  his  former  book,  but 
had  not  made  use  of,  and  which  he  then  called  The  Colour 
Sense ;  its  Origin  and  Development.  They  were  origin- 
ally designed  for  a  chapter  on  "  The  Genesis  of  Esthetics." 
Mr.  Allen's  primary  idea  was  that  the  taste  for  bright 
colours  was  derived  by  man  from  his  "  frugivorous  an- 
cestors "  ;  and  that  he  was,  in  this  respect,  on  a  par  with 
all  flower-feeding  and  fruit-eating  animals,  who  showed  it  in 
the  selection  of  their  mates. 

Two  books  which  appeared  after  the  Physiological  ^Es- 
thetics controverted  this  position.  Dr.  H.  Magnus,  in 
his  Geschichte  Entwickelung  des  Farbensinen,  maintained 
that  the  colour  -  sense  of  mankind  originated  about  the 
Homeric  period  ;  and  Mr.  Alfred  Russell  Wallace,  in  his 
Tropical  Nature,  attacked  the  theory  of  sexual  selection 
altogether.  To  reply  to  these  books,  The  Colour  Sense  was 
written.  It  is  an  extremely  able  book  ;  and  its  conclusions 
might  be  accepted  without  scruple  by  those  who  do  not 
believe  that  evolution  is  the  same  thing  as  derivation.  Mr. 
Allen  affirms  that  the  highest  aesthetic  products  of  the  race 
are  only  the  "last  link  of  a  chain  whose  first  link 'began 
with  the  insect's  selection  of  bright-hued  blossoms  "  (p.  281). 

In  connection  with  The  Colour  Sense,  a  very  able  article 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  253 

by  Mr.  Sully  in  Mind  (April  1879),  on  "The  Harmony  of 
Colour,"  should  not  be  overlooked. 

Mr.  Allen  has  contributed  many  articles  on  Esthetics 
to  Mind:  one  on  "  The  Origin  of  the  Sublime  "  (July  1878), 
another  on  "  The  Origin  of  the  Sense  of  Symmetry  "  (July 
1879),  a  third  on  "The  ^Esthetic  Evolution  of  Man" 
(Oct.  1880).  Seeking  for  the  primary  source  of  the  appre- 
ciation of  Beauty  by  man,  he  thinks  it  best  to  begin  with 
its  foreshadowings  amongst  the  lower  animals,  in  their  taste 
for  symmetry,  colour,  and  lustre,  and  also  for  sound.  He 
notes  the  fact  that  every  animal  instinctively  regards  its  own 
species  with  approval,  and  that  each  individual  thinks  its 
mate  beautiful.  Further,  the  typical  form  of  each  species 
is  the  most  beautiful  ;  and  this  normal  type  is  preferred 
in  all  healthy  natures.  Natural  selection  and  sexual  selec- 
tion co-operate,  and  the  strongest  and  best  physical  struc- 
tures are  usually  the  most  beautiful.  The  primitive  ideas 
of  beauty  "  gathered  mainly  round  the  personality  of  man 
and  woman."  There  was  very  little  appreciation  of  the 
beauty  of  Nature,  but  a  link  of  connection  between  the  two 
was  found  in  personal  decoration.  The  feelings  vaguely 
aroused  by  beautiful  objects  were  transferred  to  ornaments, 
and  thus  diverted  into  new  channels  ;  and  the  appreciation 
of  beauty  in  Handicraft  led  on  to  an  appreciation  of  it  in 
Nature.  After  personal  adornment  came  the  decoration 
of  weapons,  and  domestic  utensils,  the  home,  etc. 

An  article  on  "  The  Evolution  of  Beauty,"  by  F.  T. 
Mott,  published  in  The  Journal  of  Science  (July  1878),  is  a 
noteworthy  contribution  to  the  general  question.  Mr.  Mott 
says  we  can  only  explain  organic  phenomena  by  taking 
into  account  "  the  internal  sources  of  activity,"  as  well  as 
the  external  ones.  "  The  visible  beauty  of  the  organic  world 
depends  upon  the  correlation  between  the  sense  organs  of  the 
human  race,  and  the  concentrating  wave  of  organic  force  " 
(p.  380),  that  builds  up  each  structure  into  its  form,  as  an 
organic  whole.  That  an  object  should  appear  beautiful  is 
not  the  result  of  accidental  surroundings,  nor  of  "  any  super- 
ficial garment  spread  over  an  ugly  or  repulsive  interior. 
The  elements  of  the  beautiful  are  inherent  in  all  things  " 


254  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

(pp.  380,  381).  Beauty,  says  Mr.  Mott,  is  an  abstract  idea 
like  Truth  and  Goodness,  and  what  causes  it  to  arise  in  us 
is  our  perception  of  "  ordered  activity,"  or  unity  in  variety. 
All  objects  that  appear  beautiful  must  be  compounded  of  a 
variety  of  parts,  and  the  mind  that  perceives  the  beautiful  must 
be  "  sensitive  to  small  shades  of  difference  "  in  the  parts. 
The  active  and  rapid  discernment  of  these  minute  shades  of 
difference,  which  exist  in  every  object,  is  the  first  condition 
of  a  recognition  of  the  Beautiful  ;  but  there  is  more  than 
this.  There  must  not  only  be  a  perception  of  difference,  but 
also  of  similarity  under  the  difference,  of  identity  in  some 
things  and  of  difference  in  others,  of  like  in  difference.  If 
phenomena  form  a  group,  and  appear  as  a  unity  (whether 
of  form,  colour,  motion,  or  purpose),  the  object  is  recog- 
nised as  beautiful.  Mr.  Mott  thinks  that  "  a  mind  abso- 
lutely sensitive  to  all  shades  of  difference,  and  to  all  degrees 
of  relationship  at  the  same  time,  would  see  everywhere 
throughout  creation  variety  bound  up  in  unity,  would  find 
neither  monotony  nor  change,  discord  nor  ugliness,  but  only 
a  universal  beauty"  (p.  382).  Beauty  is  "inherent  in  every 
object."  Its  presence  is  "  an  index  of  organic  maturity." 
It  is  "only  unseen  during  embryonic  stages  "  (p.  383). 


14.  William  Morris  to  W.  P.  Ker 

In  1878-1881,  Mr.  William  Morris,  author  of  The 
Earthly  Paradise,  delivered  five  lectures  in  Birmingham, 
London,  etc.,  on  what  he  called  Hopes  and  Fears  for  Art. 
These  lectures  were  published  in  1881.  His  paper  on 
"  The  Lesser  Arts,"  and  another  on  "  The  Beauty  of  Life," 
are  of  great  value.  In  the  year  1878  he  published  The 
Decorative  Arts,  in  one  section  of  which,  on  "  The  Aims 
of  Art,"  he  affirms  that  in  the  lives  of  all  men  there 
are  moods  of  energy  and  moods  of  idleness,  recurrent  or 
combined,  and  that  this  explains  why  they  have  always 
cherished  and  practised  Art.  The  restraining  of  rest- 
lessness is  one  of  the  essential  aims  of  Art.  "  To  in- 
crease the  happiness  of  men  by  giving  them  beauty  to 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  255 

amuse  their  leisure,  and  to  prevent  them  wearying  even 
of  rest,  and  giving  them  hope  and  pleasure  in  work  ;  or, 
shortly,  to  make  work  happy  and  rest  fruitful,"  that  is  the 
aim  of  Art.  Genuine  Art  is  thus  an  unmixed  blessing  to 
the  race.  It  has,  however,  at  the  present  time  deteriorated, 
and  is  disesteemed ;  but  "the  springs  of  art  in  the  human 
mind  are  deathless."  In  the  Middle  Ages,  when  the  work- 
men who  produced  it  were  serfs,  Art  flourished  ;  and  then 
it  was  social,  hopeful,  joyous,  and  progressive.  Now  it  is 
"retrospective  and  pessimistic."  The  haste  of  our  modern 
life,  its  stress  and  strain,  is  alien  to  Art.  The  world  is 
everywhere  growing  uglier  and  more  commonplace.  It  is 
the  greed,  the  haste  to  be  rich,  which  disfigures  our  nine- 
teenth century,  which  has  wounded  Art  to  its  death.  "  The 
monster  who  has  destroyed  Beauty  is  Commercial  Profit" 
Mr.  Morris  warns  us  against  trying  to  revivify  it  "by 
dealing  with  its  dead  exterior."  "  It  is  the  aims  of  Art  that 
we  must  seek,  rather  than  the  Art  itself"  ;  and  if  we  reso- 
lutely set  ourselves  against  all  sham  and  unreality  in  it, 
we  will  enter  into  our  inheritance  of  courage,  and  hope,  and 
eager  life. 

The  Science  of  Beauty ',  an  Analytical  Inquiry  into  the 
Laws  of  dEsthetics^  by  Mr.  Avery  W.  Holmes-Forbes,  was 
published  in  1881.  Mr.  Forbes  is  an  idealist,  who  denies 
the  inherent  beauty  of  objects.  He  starts  from  the  position, 
which  he  calls  a  metaphysical  principle,  but  which  is  only 
a  psychological  assertion,  that  all  our  knowledge  is  know- 
ledge of  self  in  its  various  modes.  The  "beautiful  qualities" 
of  objects  are  therefore  "mental  creations."  "An  object 
which  we  call  beautiful  must  be  endowed  with  this  quality 
by  the  mind,  and  then  resorted  to  by  the  mind,  as  though 
the  object  possessed  that  quality  inherently  and  independ- 
ently "  (p.  i  o).  Mr.  Forbes  then  puts  forth  what  he  calls 
"a  code  "  of  laws,  on  the  subject  of  the  beautiful,  as  follows : — 

(i)  The  subjective  element  of  beauty  consists  in  the 
emotion  of  admiration.  (2)  The  objective  element  of  beauty 
consists  in  the  quality  of  suggestiveness.  (3)  Beauty  attaches 
only  to  utility.  (4)  The  appearance  of  beauty  varies  in- 
versely with  the  appearance  of  utility. 


256  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

In  his  discussion  of  the  objective  elements  of  Beauty  he 
advances  what  he  considers  to  be  a  new  theory  of  Poetry, 
viz.  that  it  "  consists  in  the  liberation  of  beautiful  analogies." 
What  is  true  in  this  is  not  new,  and  what  is  new  is  not 
true.  But  in  his  discussion  of  the  subjective  element  in 
Beauty,  the  chapter  devoted  to  the  discussion  of  the  theory 
that  the  appearance  of  Beauty  varies  inversely  with  the 
appearance  of  utility  (pp.  132-156)  contains  much  that  is 
excellent.  In  chap.  viii.  there  is  a  discussion  on  Sublimity  ; 
and  as  to  it  Mr.  Holmes-Forbes'  propositions  are — (i)  that 
Sublimity  attaches  only  to  Power,  and  (2)  that  the  appear- 
ance of  Sublimity  varies  inversely  with  the  appearance  of 
power. 

In  the  Journal  of  Science,  February  and  March  1882, 
Mr.  F.  Ram  discusses  "Beauty  in  the  eyes  of  an  evolu- 
tionist." He  derives  it  altogether  from  the  operation  of 
the  principles  of  Natural  and  Sexual  Selection.  It  is  im- 
portant to  state  his  theory  impartially,  but  its  statement 
contains  its  disproof.  Those  who  delight  most  in  the 
qualities  which  make  an  individual  the  fittest  to  survive  in 
the  struggle  for  existence  will  have  a  more  numerous  off- 
spring than  those  who  do  not,  and  by  their  survival  a  taste 
will  be  created  !  It  is  those  qualities  which  have  tended  to 
produce  "  the  largest  number  of  descendants  in  any  race 
that  constitute  Beauty  among  that  race  "  (p.  78).  "If  there 
had  never  been  sexual  selection,  there  would  have  been  no 
beauty  "  (p.  79).  The  beauty  of  a  good  complexion  is  due 
to  the  rapidity  with  which  the  red  corpuscles  of  arterial 
blood  are  carried  to  the  extremities.  "  The  physical  fact 
creates  the  beauty."  Whatever  physical  arrangement  would 
give  promise  of  many  descendants,  or  facilitate  the  increase  of 
the  species  in  the  greatest  degree,  would  ipso  facto  become 
the  most  beautiful !  Beauty  is  thus  not  only  wholly  ex- 
trinsic, but  wholly  due  to  physical  causes,  and  these  the 
most  utilitarian  possible. 

Art  and  the  Formation  of  Taste,  by  Miss  Lucy  Crane, 
was  published  in  1882.  Miss  Crane  points  out  that  Art 
originally  meant  force  or  strength,  man's  work  on  Nature, 
"  a  world  of  itself,  created  out  of  Nature  by  the  hand 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  257 

of  the  artist- workman."  "  To  it  we  owe  everything  which 
appeals  to  the  sense  of  beauty"  (p.  5).  Its  aim  is  "to 
give  pleasure  by  transforming  the  things  of  Nature  into 
the  beauty  of  picture,  statue,  or  building.  ...  It  is  Beauty 
that  is  sought  for  in  all  these  "  (p.  7).  Art  is  to  be  con- 
sidered in  three  stages — (i)  in  its  original  stage,  purely 
necessary  and  useful ;  (2)  Art  decoration  ;  (3)  Fine  Art. 
"  The  general  aim  of  Art  is  Beauty ;  and  the  appreciation 
of  that  Beauty,  the  true  enjoyment  of  it,  is  Taste;  and 
there  are  certain  principles  by  which  Taste  may  be  formed 
and  guided"  (p.  48).  "Art  is  a  universal  language,  intelli- 
gible to  the  whole  world  alike  "  (p.  242).  Decorative  Art 
yields  Beauty  of  Form  and  Beauty  of  Colour.  The  Fine 
Arts  —  Poetry,  Painting,  Sculpture,  Music,  Architecture — 
"exist  for  Beauty  alone."  They  are  "the  very  head  and 
crown  of  all  that  man  has  ever  achieved"  (p.  153).  They 
are  "the  most  lasting  and  stable  things  in  the  world's 
history."  She  thinks,  however,  that  there  can  be  "no 
universal  formula  "  of  the  Beautiful.  Mr.  Ruskin's  "  thing 
by  itself,"  Mr.  Darwin's  "sense  of  beauty  in  its  simplest 
form  is  nothing  more  than  the  reception  of  a  peculiar  kind 
of  pleasure  from  certain  colours,  forms,  and  sounds,"  do  not 
help  us  much.  She  falls  back  on  "  the  opinion  of  the 
majority,"  i.e.  of  the  educated  race.  But  beauty  "is  not  tc 
be  explained.  When  we  have  said  that  some  forms  and 
colours  are  agreeable,  while  others  are  disagreeable,  we 
have  said  all  we  can"  (p.  160). 

These  lectures,  however,  though  defective  in  their  funda- 
mental basis,  and  slightly  put  together  for  popular  uses,  are 
full  of  information  and  of  real  insight,  especially  on  the 
subjects  of  sculpture  and  architecture  ;  while  Miss  Crane's 
pictures  of  the  three  great  Florentines,  Leonardo,  Michael 
Angelo,  and  Raphael,  based  upon  a  sketch  by  M.  Cle'ment, 
are  extremely  vivid  delineations. 

In  a  volume  of  Essays  in  Philosophical  Criticism,  pub- 
lished in  1883,  Professor  W.  P.  Ker  contributed  one  on 
"the  Philosophy  of  Art."  He  thinks  that  all  Plato's 
various  teaching  on  Art  is  the  expansion  of  a  saying  of 
Socrates  in  the  Protagoras  that  discussion  on  poetry  and 

S 


258  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

its  meaning  should  be  left  to  those  whose  education  is  not 
v  finished.  Art  with  all  its  excellence  could  not  suffice  for 
man  without  philosophy.  Plato's  philosophy  of  Art  was 
almost  wholly  negative.  The  outcome  of  his  teaching  is 
"  that  there  is  one  idea  of  Beauty,  eternal,  the  same  with 
itself,  consisting  not  in  the  likeness  of  anything  in  heaven 
or  earth,  and  that  earthly  beauty  is  a  stage  on  the  way 
to  this"  (p.  163).  The  theory  that  Art  is  but  a  stage 
toward  true  knowledge,  and  its  value  mainly  educative, 
Mr.  Ker  regards  as  a  meagre  and  an  incomplete  theory, 
and  one  that  is  "of  very  doubtful  value  if  taken  by  itself" 
(p.  164).  Art  is  not  an  education  for  an  end  different 
from  Art  itself  (p.  1 66) ;  and  the  problem  which  the 
philosophy  of  Art  has  to  solve  is  "  what  is  the  kind  of 
end  which  the  artist  attains?"  (p.  167).  Art  and  Science 
are  very  similar  at  the  outset,  but  completed  Science  differs 
from  completed  Art.  In  the  former,  individual  things,  pheno- 
mena, are  of  use  only  as  yielding  laws  and  principles.  In 
Art  the  particular  things  have  a  reality,  an  interest,  and  a 
value  of  their  own.  A  scientific  fact  is  explained  by  its 
relation  to  other  things  ;  an  artistic  product  explains  itself. 
"  Science  has  to  go  on,  increasing  the  sum  of  knowledge, 
t  without  drawing  any  nearer  the  end.  Art  is  an  attempt  to 
find  a  cure  for  this.  It  is  a  mode  in  which  the  mind  can 
make  part  of  the  objective  world  intelligible  to  itself  without 
being  troubled  by  continual  reference  to  other  parts  of  the 
objective  world  beyond  the  limits  it  has  chosen.  It  is  a 
return  of  the  mind  to  itself  from  seeking  fact  after  fact,  and 
law  after  law,  in  the  objective  world  ;  a  recognition  that  the 
mind  itself  is  an  end  to  itself,  and  its  own  law"  (p.  173). 
f.  t»  "In  Art  the  opposition  between  the  one  and  the  many, 
between  the  law  and  its  manifestation,  between  the  subject 
and  the  object,  is  overcome,  not  by  the  abolition  of  the  dis- 
tinction between  them,  but  by  so  uniting  them  that  each 
receives  the  meaning  of  the  other"  (p.  176).  Art  is  both 
a  revelation  and  the  vindication  of  freedom.  It  is  not  to  be 
explained  by  the  categories  of  the  finite,  still  less  by  physio- 
logical detail,  which  refer  only  to  its  conditions.  It  is  self- 
sufficing,  and  there  is  an  infinite  element  in  it,  because  it  is 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  259 

"  free  from  the  darkness  and  incomprehensibility,  which 
is  the  curse  of  finite  things"  (p.  178).  It  is  higher  than 
science,  because  it  is  "  not  limited  by  an  objective  world," 
and  "can  boast  of  conquests  which  are  absolute."  The 
philosophy  of  Art  is  less  abstract  than  pure  metaphysics  or 
ethics.  It  deals  with  its  creations,  not  in  their  universality, 
but  in  their  individuality.  Its  philosophy  is  a  philosophy 
of  History  as  well ;  and  explaining  the  causes  which  led  to 
the  rise  of  particular  arts  at  particular  times,  it  shows  their 
relation  to  the  universal  life  and  the  organic  thought  of  the 
world.  Mr.  Ker's  is  one  of  the  ablest  of  modern  essays. 
to  be  ranked  with  Dr.  Todhunter's  lecture  (see  p.  240). 


15.  W.  G.  Collingwood  to  J.  A.  Symonds 

The  Philosophy  of  Ornament  (1883) — eight  lectures  on 
the  History  of  Decorative  Art,  given  at  University  College, 
Liverpool — by  W.  Gershom  Collingwood,  is  one  of  the  very 
best  discussions  of  the  subject  in  our  literature.  It  deals 
with  the  earliest  beginnings  of  Art,  with  that  of  Egypt  and 
Assyria,  Persia,  China,  and  Japan,  with  Greek  and  Gothic 
Art,  with  the  cinque  cento  renaissance,  the  seventeenth  and 
eighteenth  centuries,  and  with  the  art  of  the  present  day. 
It  is  doubtful  if  in  any  compend  on  the  subject  there  is  such 
a  philosophic  group  of  principles  and  such  condensed 
exposition  of  detail.  The  title  of  the  book  is  aptly  chosen, 
because  these  unpretentious  lectures  are  fertile  with  the 
germs  of  a  profound  philosophy  of  Art.  It  will  live,  when 
more  ambitious  treatises  are  forgotten. 

In  the  same  year  (1883)  Mr.  T.  C.  Horsfall,  of  Man- 
chester, issued  a  little  book,  which  he  called  The  Study  of 
Beauty  and  Art,  in  Large  Towns,  with  an  Introduction  by 
Mr.  Ruskin.  Though  he  says  it  is  impossible  to  give  an 
exact  definition  of  Beauty,  he  thinks  it  is  possible  to  advance 
some  "unquestionable  truths  respecting  its  nature."  He 
finds  a  close  analogy  between  the  beauty  which  appeals  to- 
the  eye  and  that  which  appeals  to  the  ear.  What  he  calls 
Sensuous  Beauty  owes  its  charm  to  "  giving  to  our  nervous 


260  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

system  an  activity  which  is  conducive  to  health."  He  next 
says,  somewhat  vaguely,  that  an  important  element  in 
Beauty  is  Tightness,  i.e.  the  object  regarded  by  us  as  beauti- 
ful must  have  "the  qualities  which  it  ought  to  have."  Mr. 
Horsfall  shows  how  the  love  of  Beauty  gives  knowledge, 
and  still  better,  he  shows  how  by  a  strong  love  of  Beauty 
beautiful  things  become  part  of  ourselves  ;  while  to  love 
Beauty  is  to  see  it  almost  everywhere.  Mr.  Horsfall  has 
been  the  life  and  soul  of  the  movement  in  Manchester  to 
establish  an  Art  Museum  for  the  people,  and  its  remarkable 
success  is  almost  exclusively  due  to  his  continuous  labour 
in  the  cause. 

In  1885  a  volume  appeared  on  The  Nature  of  the  Fine 
Arts,  by  Mr.  H.  Parker.  It  discusses  Art  and  Science, 
Theory  and  Practice,  Realism,  Taste,  and  the  several  arts. 
It  is  full  of  scattered  wisdom,  but  is  ill  arranged  ;  and  even 
in  each  chapter  the  discussion,  abounding  in  wealth  of  illus- 
tration, is  inconsecutive.  It  abandons  a  theory  of  the 
Beautiful  in  favour  of  a  critical  discussion  of  the  Arts. 

In  a  series  of  eight  articles  contributed  to  Knowledge 
(from  loth  April  to  22d  May  1885)  the  late  Miss  Constance 
C.  W.  Naden  expanded  an  address  which  she  originally 
read  to  a  meeting  of  the  Mason  Science  College  Union 
at  Birmingham  in  the  previous  year.  These  papers  contain 
one  of  the  ablest  statements  of  the  experiential  theory  of 
the  origin  of  Beauty,  and  our  appreciation  of  it ;  and  it  is 
to  be  regretted  that  they  were  not  reproduced  in  the  volume 
of  Miss  Naden's  essays,  posthumously  issued.  They  are 
of  much  greater  value  than  the  other  papers  which  have 
been  published. 

Miss  Naden  begins  by  provisionally  defining  Beauty  as 
"that  quality  or  assemblage  of  qualities  which  please  the 
eye,"  but  proceeds  at  once  to  try  to  answer  the  question 
of  the  origin  of  the  sense  of  Beauty,  and  how  it  has  been 
evolved ;  and  she  seems  to  identify  this  inquiry  at  the 
outset  with  the  question,  "  Why  we  take  pleasure  in  objects 
natural  and  artificial."  She  deals  first  with  the  pleasures  of 
Colour,  and  secondly  with  those  of  Form. 

Beginning  with  the  lilies  of  the  field  and  the  fowls  of 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  261 

the  air,  she  asks  how  the  former  have  gained  their  variety, 
delicacy,  and  brilliancy.  Insects  seek  out  flowers  that  are 
conspicuous  ;  and  the  flowers  that  are  conspicuous  possess 
a  charm  simply  because  of  their  conspicuousness.  Similarly, 
the  fowls  of  the  air  obtain  their  brilliancy  of  plumage  by 
courtship.  She  follows  Mr.  Allen  in  believing  that  the 
colour-sense  in  insects  has  been  developed  in  connection 
with  the  flowers  on  which  they  feed,  and  that  of  birds  and 
mammals  in  connection  with  fruits.  Bright  flowers,  these 
writers  say,  attract  insects,  and  therefore  the  brightness 
increases  from  generation  to  generation.  But  the  radical 
question  is,  What  led  to  the  first  attraction  in  the  primitive 
brightness  ?  and  that  question  is  not  answered  by  either  of 
them. 

Miss  Naden  starts,  as  Mr.  Allen  does,  from  the  physio- 
logical fact  that  the  normal  exercise  of  every  function  gives 
pleasure,  and  that  joyous  life  is  the  normal  activity  of  the 
senses  ;  but  she  alters  Mr.  Allen's  formula,  "  the  maximum 
of  stimulation  with  a  minimum  of  fatigue,"  by  substituting 
the  phrase  "the  maximum  of  activity."  In  order  to  this 
maximum  of  activity  there  must  be  (i)  variety  in  the 
stimuli,  and  (2)  "  smoothness  or  continuity."  She  states, 
and  adopts  as  a  workable  hypothesis,  the  Young-Helmholtz 
theory  of  ether- waves,  producing — according  to  their  re- 
spective lengths — the  sensations  of  red,  green,  and  violet. 
A  single  bright  colour  pleases,  because  it  stimulates,  yet 
permits  of  rest ;  but  a  contrast  of  colours  gives  more  pleasure, 
because  it  gives  more  easy  and  varied  action.  She  criticises 
Mr.  Allen's  theory  that  the  prolonged  contemplation  of  a 
colour  overworks  the  nerves,  and  therefore  lessens  its  brilli- 
ancy. Her  theory  is  that  the  fibres  of  the  retina  which 
have  been  excited  by  one  colour,  when  summoned  to  re- 
spond to  waves  of  light  of  a  different  length,  feel  discomfort 
from  the  new  stimulus,  which  lasts  till  the  old  stimulus 
ceases,  and  the  fibres  are  tuned  to  the  new  one,  and  so  on 
with  other  vibrations.  Easy  gradations  from  one  colour  to 
another  being  the  condition  of  pleasure,  the  enjoyment  of 
light  and  shade  is  due  to  "  a  gradual  passing  of  action  into 
rest,  and  rest  into  action." 


262  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

In  reference  to  the  second  set  of  pleasures  Miss  Naden 
follows  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer  in  his  explanation  of  tile  relish 
for  varieties  of  Form — curved  lines  being  preferred  to 
straight  or  angular  ones — as  due  to  the  easier  action  of 
the  ocular  muscles.  The  gratification  thence  resulting  is 
both  physical  and  mental.  She  credits  the  "  cerebral 
hemispheres"  with  "taking  note  of  the  similarities  and 
dissimilarities  of  surrounding  objects."  "They  receive  the 
intellectual  stimulus."  "A  taste  for  new  combinations," 
developed  in  the  bird,  gives  rise  to  all  the  varieties  of  colour 
and  form,  which  are  the  outcome  of  a  healthy  and  vigorous 
life. 

Miss  Naden  believed  that  the  aesthetic  sense  in  man 
sprang  originally  from  very  simple  germs,  but  that  it  has 
been  subjected  to  numerous  and  complex  influences,  which 
have  increased  in  number  and  complexity  as  civilisation 
has  advanced.  The  energies  at  first  needed  exclusively  for 
the  maintenance  of  life,  were  gradually  set  free  for  its 
advancement.  Gradually  subtle  shades,  and  gradations  of 
Beauty,  began  to  be  noted.  Colours  came  to  have  emotional 
meanings.  The  appreciation  of  beauty  in  human  form 
followed,  and  when  mind  was  seen  to  be  more  powerful  than 
brute  force,  intellectual  features  were  preferred  to  animal 
ones  in  man. 

Some  light  has  been  cast  on  the  evolution  of  the  Greek 
ideal  of  Beauty  by  Sir  Francis  Dalton's  composite  photo- 
graphy. By  throwing  a  number  of  different  portraits 
rapidly  on  a  sensitised  photographic  plate,  we  have  for 
result  a  generic  portrait,  with  the  peculiarities  of  each 
removed,  and  the  type  of  all  preserved.  This  illustrates 
the  formation  of  generic  ideas.  Individual  features  are 
removed,  and  the  compound  image  which  results  is  the 
incarnation  of  the  best  or  finest  features  of  thousands  of 
individuals. 

At  the  close  of  her  discussion,  Miss  Naden  succumbs 
somewhat  helplessly  to  the  influence  of  her  tutors,  and  her 
essay — brilliant  and  suggestive  as  it  is — ends  in  rhetorical 
commonplace. 

In  a  critical  essay  on  The  Signification  and  Principles  of 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  263 


,  Mr.  C.  H.  Waterhouse  tries  to  determine  the 
essential  nature  of  the  Fine  Arts,  to  distinguish  them  from 
other  modes  of  human  activity,  and  to  discover  the  founda- 
tion of  Art  in  the  nature  of  man  and  of  the  world.  Art  is 
the  apprehension  of  the  Beautiful,  through  the  avenues  of 
sense.  The  artist  differs  from  the  scientific  inquirer  in  that 
he  creates.  Art  implies  a  formative  faculty  as  well  as  an 
aesthetic  sense  ;  and  the  artist  studies  Form  —  through 
which  feeling  finds  expression  —  for  its  own  sake.  It  is  the 
intrinsic  attractiveness  of  Form  that  gives  to  the  Fine  Arts 
their  raison  d'etre.  Instructive  is  distinguished  from  Fine 
Art  in  the  same  way  that  use  is  distinguished  from  orna- 
ment. When  Writing  (a  useful  Art)  becomes  Illuminating, 
it  is  a  decorative  Art  ;  so  when  Building  becomes  Archi- 
tecture the  utile  gives  place  to  the  duke.  The  work, 
however,  is  too  diffuse  and  repetitive. 

An  English  translation  of  the  introductory  part  of 
Hegel's  Philosophy  of  Fine  Art  was  issued,  with  notes 
and  a  prefatory  essay,  by  Mr.  Bernard  Bosanquet  in  1886. 
Earlier  in  the  same  year  a  translation  of  Michelet's  summary 
of  Hegel's  system,  by  W.  Hastie,  was  published  along  with 
a  part  of  Hegel's  own  Introduction  to  his  Aesthetik,  Mr. 
Hastie  writing  an  Introduction  to  both.  These  books  are 
extremely  serviceable,  and  of  greater  use  to  the  student  of 
the  subject  than  three  similar  contributions  to  American 
literature  referred  to  at  p.  279.  Mr.  Bosanquet's  short 
Introduction  to  his  version  of  Hegel  is  excellent,  and  must 
raise  special  expectation  in  reference  to  his  forthcoming 
History  of  ^Esthetic.  Had  the  latter  work  been  already 
issued,  it  would  probably  have  rendered  the  present  His- 
torical Outline  superfluous. 

In  his  Sententiae  Artis  (1886),  Mr.  H.  Quilter  gives,  as 
his  first  principle  of  Art,  that  it  is  an  expression  of  life  with 
all  its  varying  emotions.  "  Deep  down  in  the  nature  of 
man  there  lie,  sometimes  half-hidden,  certain  verities  which 
are  universal  in  their  appeal,  immutable  in  their  reality  ; 
and  it  is  to  shadow  forth  these  in  its  unspoken  language  that 
Art  lives  —  lives  to  express,  as  no  other  manifestation  of 
humanity  is  able,  the  triple  connection  of  sense,  spirit,  and 


264  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

intellect "  (p.  3).  "  There  is  nothing  that  man  has  ever 
dreamed,  or  hoped,  or  feared,  suffered,  enjoyed,  or  sinned 
in,  which  is  not  a  subject  matter  for  Art ;  nor  is  there  a 
single  aspect  of  the  mind  or  spirit  which  has  not,  or  may 
not  have,  some  analogue  in  form  and  colour "  (p.  4). 
"  Every  great  picture  is  a  record,  not  only  of  sight,  but  of 
insight,  and  perhaps  the  ratio  of  its  greatness  is  in  direct 
proportion  to  the  complexity  of  its  meaning  "  (p.  6).  "  A 
great  picture  is  like  a  skeleton  key,  in  that  it  may  have 
been  made  for  a  special  purpose,  and  yet  will  unlock  many 
doors "  (p.  7).  He  distinguishes  acutely  between  things 
which  are  "  beautiful  in  themselves,  and  those  which  are 
beautiful  in  spite  of  themselves  "  (p.  13). 

The  Development  of  Taste,  and  other  Studies  in  ^Esthetics, 
by  Mr.  W.  Proudfoot  Begg  (1887),  deals  with  the  develop- 
ment of  a  sense  of  Beauty  in  Nature — (i)  amongst  the  lower 
animals,  prehistoric  man,  savages,  and  the  Egyptians  and 
Assyrians ;  (2)  amongst  the  Hebrews ;  (3)  amongst  the 
Greeks,  and  (4)  the  Romans  ;  (5)  throughout  English  litera- 
ture ;  and  (6)  in  modern  times.  He  then  discusses  the 
standard  of  Taste,  the  origin  of  our  ideas  of  Beauty,  the 
association  theory,  the  nature  of  the  beautiful,  the  pictur- 
esque, the  sublime,  and  the  general  subject  of  the  univer- 
sality of  Beauty.  There  is  a  great  deal  of  detached  and 
stimulating  thinking  in  the  aesthetic  studies  of  Mr.  Begg. 
The  historical  knowledge,  both  of  philosophy  and  literature, 
is  much  greater  than  appears  upon  the  surface. 

In  the  Fortnightly  Review,  October  1887,  Mr.  Walter 
Pater  contributed  an  article  on  "  The  School  of  Giorgione," 
in  which  he  advocates  an  art-theory  at  the  opposite  pole 
from  that  of  Matthew  Arnold.  (An  earlier  discussion  by 
Mr.  Pater,  his  Renaissance,  Studies  in  Art  and  Poetry, 
1877,  should  be  mentioned,  especially  for  its  admirable 
study  of  Winckelmann.)  Instead  of  making  the  intel- 
lectual element  the  major  one  in  art,  Mr.  Pater  makes 
the  sensuous  all-dominant.  He  affirms  that  all  the  arts 
tend  "  towards  the  principle  or  condition  of  music,"  in  which 
the  distinction  between  matter  and  form  is  obliterated. 
"  In  its  ideal,  the  end  is  not  distinct  from  the  means,  the 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  265 

form  from  the  matter,  the  subject  from  the  expression. 
They  inhere  in,  and  completely  saturate  each  other " ;  and 
although  the  several  arts  have  each  its  distinct  area,  and 
its  incommunicable  element,  they  all  tend  towards  this  goal, 
"which  music  alone  completely  realises."  In  all  high 
Art,  therefore,  the  intellectual  element — thought — sinks  to 
the  background,  while  the  sensuous  element  occupies  the 
foreground.  This  is  Mr.  Pater's  theory.  It  is  not  that 
matter  and  form  blend  perfectly  in  perfect  art,  and  cannot 
be  sundered  without  injury  to  both  ;  it  is  that  art  approaches 
perfection  the  vaguer  and  mistier  it  is,  when  "definite 
meaning  almost  expires,  or  reaches  us  through  ways  not 
traceable  by  the  understanding."  This  is,  however,  a  sect- 
arian theory,  if  applied,  as  Mr.  Pater  would  apply  it,  all 
round  the  circle  of  the  Arts.  Not  only  is  poetry  in  its 
nature  a  more  intellectual  art  than  music,  which  is  more 
sensuous  ;  but  both  in  poetry  and  music  there  are  intellectual 
and  sensuous  elements,  and  it  is  possible  for  us  by  means  of 
music  to  be  borne  into  a  region  of  clearest  intellectual  vision, 
and  contrariwise  to  be  carried  through  poetry  into  the  land 
of  the  lotus-eaters,  if  not  to  one  resembling  the  Buddhist 
nirvana. 

In  the  Transactions  of  the  National  Association  for  the 
Advancement  of  Art,  and  its  application  to  Industry, 
which  was  founded  in  1888,  there  are  many  papers  of 
value.  They  all  touch  the  subject  of  ^Esthetic  less  or 
more,  and  the  addresses  of  the  Presidents  of  the  several 
sections,  in  the  three  years  during  which  the  society  has 
been  in  existence,  as  well  as  those  of  many  of  the  members,  if 
not  contributions  to  the  theory  of  Art,  are  excellent  illustra- 
tions of  it.  Mr.  Alma  Tadema,  Mr.  Holman  Hunt,  Mr. 
William  Morris,  Mr.  Briton  Riviere,  Mr.  G.  F.  Watts,  and 
other  representative  artists  and  art-critics,  have  contributed 
to  these  Transactions. 

Principle  in  Art,  etc.,  by  Coventry  Patmore,  was  pub- 
lished in  1889.  He  discusses  many  subjects  besides  Art, 
but  the  paper  which  gives  its  title  to  the  volume  is  a 
vindication  of  "  principle  "  as  superior  to  mere  "  taste  "  in 
Art.  Bad  Art,  he  says,  collapses  before  good  criticism  ; 


266  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

and  "  although  good  criticism  cannot  produce  Art,  it  re- 
moves hindrances  to  its  production."  Mr.  Patmore  thinks 
that  there  exist  "in  the  writings  of  Aristotle,  Hegel, 
Lessing,  Goethe,  and  others  "  the  "  materials  necessary  for 
the  formation  of  a  body  of  Institutes  of  Art,  which  would 
supersede,  and  extinguish  nearly  all  the  desultory  matter, 
which  now  passes  for  criticism,  and  which  would  go  far 
to  form  a  true  and  abiding  popular  taste."  This  may 
be  very  warrantably  doubted,  especially  its  finality  clause. 
The  most  useful  essay  in  Mr.  Patmore's  book  is  that  on 
"Architectural  Styles"  (pp.  160-201). 

The  Rev.  Michael  Maher,  in  his  Psychology  (1890),  in 
the  Stonyhurst  Series  of  Manuals  of  Catholic  Philosophy, 
discusses  "  the  ^Esthetic  Emotions  "  towards  the  close  of  his 
book.  The  first  and  essential  property  of  Beauty  is  that  it 
pleases.  Usually  two  things  unite  to  produce  this  pleasure — a 
sensuous  charm,  and  an  exercise  of  the  imagination.  Unity 
in  variety  is  the  most  universal  feature  in  beautiful  objects. 
Symmetry,  order,  fitness,  harmony,  and  the  like,  are  but 
special  forms  of  this  unity  in  the  manifold.  On  the  one 
hand,  monotony  wearies  us  ;  on  the  other,  chaotic  variety 
and  incessant  change  distract,  and  prevent  a  coherent  grasp 
of  things  ;  but  when  variety  is  presided  over  by  unity,  it 
produces  in  us  "the  luxurious  feeling  of  delight"  (p.  411). 
Mr.  Maher  then  refers  to  utility,  and  emphasises  the  well- 
known  rule  of  Gothic  Art  that  no  ornament  is  to  appear  for 
the  sake  of  ornament.  He  distinguishes  between  relative 
and  absolute  beauty,  and  discusses  both  the  sublime  and 
the  ludicrous. 

Essays,  Speculative  and  Suggestive,  is  the  title  which  Mr. 
John  Addington  Symonds — the  author  of  the  Renaissance 
in  Italy,  etc. — gives  to  two  volumes  of  admirable  criticism 
published  in  1890.  They  were  written  from  Mr.  Symonds' 
retreat  at  Davoz,  and  relate  to  the  philosophy  of  evolu- 
tion, to  the  provinces  of  the  several  Arts,  to  Idealism  and 
Realism,  to  Beauty,  Style,  Expression,  Poetry,  Music, 
Nature-myths,  and  Allegories.  He  thinks  that  the  accept- 
ance of  the  doctrine  of  evolution,  instead  of  crushing  the 
aspirations  of  men,  and  reducing  our  conceptions  of  the 


xii  The  Philosophy  of  Britain  267 

world  to  chaos,  may  be  expected  to  reanimate  religion,  and 
to  restore  spirituality  to  the  Universe.  In  his  work  on  the 
Renaissance,  and  his  Essays,  Mr.  Symonds  had  touched  the 
subject  of  Beauty  from  many  points ;  but  he  has  done 
nothing  better  in  literary  and  philosophical  criticism  than  in 
his  latest  volumes. 

The  essay  on  "Realism  and  Idealism"  is  an  effective 
vindication  of  both  as  tendencies  and  principles  of  Art. 
This  is  further  developed  in  his  essay  on  "Beauty 
Expressions,  etc."  Mr.  Symonds  thinks  that  in  one  sense 
Art  can  never  rival  Nature  in  Beauty,  because,  as  he  puts 
it,  "  Man  has  not  the  means  at  his  command  to  do  so — 
not  the  material  for  sculpture,  which  shall  reproduce  flesh 
surface — not  the  pigments  for  painting,  which  shall  render 
light  and  darkness,  atmosphere  and  colour,  as  they  truly 
are"  (vol.  i.  p.  214).  But  then,  per  contra,  Mr.  Symonds 
finds  that  "there  is  a  Beauty  which  is  never  found  in 
Nature,  but  which  requires  a  working  of  human  thought  to 
elicit  it  from  Nature ;  a  beauty  not  of  parts  and  single 
persons,  but  of  complex  totalities,  a  beauty  not  of  flesh  and 
blood,  but  of  mind,  imagination,  feeling.  It  is  this  synthetic, 
intellectual,  spirit  -  penetrated  beauty  to  which  the  arts 
aspire."  He  refers  to  the  Panathenaic  procession,  and  to 
the  sculptures  by  Phidias  on  the  frieze  of  the  Parthenon,  and 
says  :  "  No  procession  could  have  made  such  music  to  the 
understanding  as  the  sculpture  does.  In  compensation  for 
that  which  art  must  miss  when  matched  with  life,  something 
has  been  added — permanent,  enduring,  tranquil,  inexhaust- 
ible in  harmonies"  (p.  216). 

Mr.  Symonds  states  the  positions  of  the  Idealists  in  Art 
so  well,  that  it  is  better  to  quote  his  words  than  to  translate 
and  comment  on  them.  "  The  mind,  reflecting  upon 
Nature,  and  generalising  the  various  suggestions  of  Beauty 
which  it  has  received  from  Nature,  becomes  aware  of  an 
Infinity  which  it  can  only  grasp  through  thought  and  feel- 
ing, which  shall  never  be  fully  revealed  upon  this  earth,  but 
which  poetry  and  art  bring  nearer  to  our  sensuous  percep- 
tions. ...  It  is  the  function  of  all  true  art  to  add  'the 
gleam,  the  light  that  never  was  on  sea  or  land '  upon  the 


268  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful        CH.  xn 

things  which  have  been  observed  in  Nature.  It  is  the 
function  of  Art  to  give  the  world  a  glimpse  and  foretaste 
of  that  universal  beauty  by  selecting  from  natural  objects 
their  choicest  qualities,  and  combining  these  in  a  harmony 
beyond  the  sphere  of  actual  material  things"  (p.  218). 


CHAPTER   XIII 

THE   PHILOSOPHY   OF   AMERICA 

i.  1815  to 


THE  earliest  discussion  of  the  subject  of  Beauty  in  American 
literature  would  seem  to  be  in  the  fifth  volume  of  the 
Portfolio,  published  at  Philadelphia  in  1815,  in  which 
there  are  two  articles  entitled  "  Thoughts  of  a  Hermit." 
It  is  an  acute  criticism  of  the  association  theory  of  Alison 
and  Jeffrey.  The  writer  maintains  that  the  eye  is  "  sus- 
ceptible of  direct  organic  pleasure,"  that  the  "  physical 
beauty  of  visible  objects  consists,  first,  in  their  power  of 
reflecting  soft  light  ;  secondly,  in  certain  colours  ;  thirdly, 
in  particular  outlines  and  forms  ;  and  fourthly,  in  variety 
produced  by  a  mixture  of  shade  with  light,  or  by  combina- 
tion of  different  colours,  or  of  different  forms"  (p.  150). 
These  "  principles  of  visual  beauty  "  he  illustrates  in  detail. 
(i)  The  beauty  of  the  diamond  is  due  to  its  "permanently 
reflecting  a  more  vivid  light  than  any  other  body  "  ;  so  with 
other  gems,  even  with  cut  glass,  and  icicles.  Lustre  is 
intrinsically  beautiful.  (2)  As  to  Colour,  he  maintains  that 
no  colour  is  beautiful  everywhere,  but  that  each  colour  is 
beautiful  in  its  way,  and  in  particular  places  and  relations. 
(3)  Under  Form  he  analyses  the  beauty  of  the  cone,  the 
sphere,  the  cylinder,  the  circle,  the  oval,  which  are  all 
superior  to  the  triangle  or  the  square.  In  the  second 
article  he  affirms  that  though  different  persons  judge  differ- 
ently of  the  same  object,  and  the  same  persons  judge 
differently  of  different  things  in  the  same  object,  or  of  the 


270  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

same  thing  in  different  objects,  it  does  not  follow  that 
Beauty  is  not  intrinsic,  any  more  than  that  differences  in 
physical  tastes  make  what  we  perceive  by  means  of  them 
altogether  relative.  He  also  directs  attention  to  the  fact 
that  the  term  "  Beauty "  has  been  extended  from  objects 
the  presence  of  which  gives  pleasure  to  the  senses,  to  other 
objects  which  give  us  similar  pleasure,  and  so  we  come  to 
speak  of  the  beauty  of  a  poem  or  of  a  theory. 

In  the  North  American  Review,  No.  XIX.  (May  1818), 
there  is  an  article  on  Beauty,  in  criticism  of  the  discussion 
by  Jeffrey  in  the  supplement  to  the  Encyclopedia  Britannica, 
December  1816,  but  it  is  on  the  whole  an  echo  of  Jeffrey's 
teaching.  The  writer  holds  that  we  cannot  resolve  the 
elements  of  beauty  into  any  one  principle  of  our  nature, 
that  they  are  "  essentially  dissimilar  and  distinct."  It  does 
not  follow  that  because  we  class  the  beautiful  things  that 
please  us  under  a  common  term,  they  have  anything  in 
common ;  any  more  than  because  the  term  "  good "  is 
applied  to  many  things,  they  have  necessarily  anything  in 
common.  "When  we  seek  for  the  substance,  the  very 
essence  of  beauty,  we  lose  ourselves  in  abstract  subtilties." 
"  Beauty  is  not  the  same  thing  in  a  tune  and  a  statue,  in  a 
theorem  and  a  poem."  "  Indeed  the  difference  between 
what  is  beautiful  and  not,  is  often  but  a  difference  of 
degree."  "  Of  the  beautiful  in  the  abstract  we  can  acquire 
no  fuller  knowledge  than  the  progressive  generalisations  of 
the  term.  The  subject  only  admits  of  philological  research  " ! 
From  these  extracts  it  will  be  seen  that  the  writer  merely 
adopts  the  doctrine  of  the  Scottish  associationalists  with- 
out adding  anything  of  value  to  it. 

Ralph  Waldo  Emerson  discussed  the  subject  of  Beauty 
in  two  essays — the  first  in  his  book  on  Nature  (published  in 
1836),  and  the  second  in  his  Conduct  of  Life,  issued  in 
1860.  In  his  first  essay,  Emerson  affirms  that  Nature 
"  satisfies  us  by  its  loveliness,"  without  any  reference  to  its 
utility ;  and  that  it  utters  itself  at  times  in  ways  that 
"  Homer  or  Shakespeare  could  not  re-form  for  us  in  words." 
He  recognises  its  changefulness — "  Every  hour  there  is  a 
picture,  which  was  never  seen  before,  and  which  shall  never 


xin  The  Philosophy  of  America  271 

be  seen  again."  "Go  forth  to  find  it,  and  it  is  gone." 
Beauty  is  "  a  mark  set  upon  virtue."  "  The  creation  of 
Beauty  is  Art."  "A  work  of  art  is  an  abstract  or  epitome 
of  the  world,  an  expression  of  nature  in  miniature." 
"  Nothing  is  quite  beautiful  alone  :  nothing  but  is  beautiful 
in  the  whole.  A  single  object  is  only  so  far  beautiful,  as  it 
suggests  universal  grace."  "  In  its  largest  and  profoundest 
sense,  it  is  one  expression  for  the  universe.  Truth,  and 
goodness,  and  beauty  are  but  different  faces  of  the  same 
All." 

In  his  second  essay,  in  the  Conduct  of  Life,  Emerson 
says  that  it  is  to  Winckelmann  that  we  owe  the  rise  of 
enthusiasm  in  the  study  of  Beauty,  "  side  by  side  with  the 
arid  departmental  post-mortem  science."  He  tells  us  that 
Beauty  takes  us  out  of  surfaces  to  the  foundation  of  things. 
He  does  not  attempt  a  definition  of  Beauty,  but  prefers 
to  enumerate  its  qualities.  "We  ascribe  Beauty  to  that 
which  is  simple ;  which  has  no  superfluous  parts  ;  which 
exactly  answers  its  end  ;  which  stands  related  to  all  things  ; 
which  is  the  mean  of  many  extremes.  It  is  the  most 
enduring  quality,  and  the  most  ascending  quality."  "All 
beauty  is  organic ;  outside  embellishment  is  deformity." 
"  Beautiful  as  is  the  symmetry  of  any  form,  if  the  form  can 
move  we  have  a  more  excellent  symmetry.  This  is  the 
charm  of  running  water,  sea  waves,  the  flight  of  birds,  and 
the  locomotion  of  animals."  He  quotes  a  saying  of  Michael 
Angelo  that  Beauty  is  "the  purgation  of  superfluities." 
"  There  is  not  a  particle  to  spare  in  natural  structures.  The 
art  of  omission  is  a  chief  secret  of  power."  Beauty  in 
Nature  is  but  the  shadow  and  forerunner  of  beauty  in  man. 
But  nothing  is  truly  beautiful  until  it  "  speaks  to  the 
imagination,"  and  this  explains  how  Beauty  defies  analysis. 
Wherever  it  exists,  it  lifts  the  object  in  which  it  appears 
out  of  its  isolation,  and  unites  it  with  the  universal. 

In  the  first  part  of  a  work  written  by  Samuel  Tyler,  of 
the  Maryland  bar,  New  York,  1848,  and  entitled  Robert 
Burns,  as  a  Poet  and  as  a  Man,  we  find  the  theory  announced 
that  "the  sublimity  of  the  material  world  is  derived  from 
association  with  man,  and  his  spiritual  characteristics ; 


272  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

and  the  beauty  of  the  material  world  is  derived  from 
association  with  woman,  and  her  spiritual  characteristics." 
"  What  I  mean  by  the  Beautiful,"  he  says,  "  is  whatever  in 
the  material  world  produces  impressions  within  us  analo- 
gous to  those  awakened  in  us  by  our  intercourse  with 
woman."  "  In  fact  I  make  woman  the  spiritual  dispenser 
of  beauty  to  the  world."  This,  which  is  the  most  puerile 
of  theories,  is  taken  from  Haydon.  Haydon  held  that 
Beauty  resided  only  in  the  female  form,  and  that  when  we 
see  it  elsewhere,  it  exists  in  proportion  to  the  resemblance 
of  the  beautiful  thing  to  female  beauty  !  But  surely  the 
latter  is  a  composite  beauty,  due  to  the  union  of  many 
qualities  or  elements  each  separately  beautiful.  Women 
are  beautiful  because  of  the  possession  of  certain  qualities. 
The  qualities  are  not  beautiful,  because  we  find  them  in 
women.1 

Mr.  Hope,  reviewing  this  work  in  the  Princeton  Review 
(April  1849),  falls  back  upon  an  ultimate  law  of  our  nature, 
by  which  we  receive  pleasure  from  external  objects  which 
contain  beauty.  But  he  says  :  "  The  exercise  of  taste  in  man 
is  complex,  and  includes  other  elements."  "The  human 
mind  is  not  like  a  building  made  up  of  separate  and 
independent  apartments,  each  of  which  is  appropriated  to  a 
separate  mental  faculty,  but  like  a  single  chamber,  into 
which  light  streams  through  various  windows  of  differently 
coloured  glass.  There  are  not  so  many  distinct  images 
formed  by  each  faculty,  but  one  single  image,  formed  by  the 
blending  of  the  several  beams  admitted  through  each 
aperture.  In  other  words,  Beauty  is  never  seen  through 
a  pure  aesthetic  medium,  but  a  medium  that  is  tinged  with 
the  varied  hues  of  human  thought  and  feeling,  which  ema- 
nate from  the  intellectual  and  moral  nature  of  the  beholder 
himself.  The  sense  of  beauty  is  therefore  a  highly  complex 

1  A  Dr.  J.  Fan,  in  his  Anatomy  of  the  external  Form  of  Man, 
intended  for  the  use  of  Artists,  Painters,  and  Sculptors  (London  1849), 
holds  that  the  beauty  of  the  human  form  is  due  to  the  concealment  of 
the  underlying  physical  structure  by  a  surface  raiment  of  smooth  flesh. 
Dr.  Robert  Knox  (Dr.  Fan's  editor)  adopts  his  theory,  and  concurs 
with  Haydon  that  ' '  the  absolutely  beautiful "  is  to  be  found  only  in  the 
full-grown  woman — a  most  sectarian  art-theory. 


xin  The  Philosophy  of  America  273 

thing."  Mr.  Hope  thinks  that  the  attempts  of  philosophers 
to  get  at  one  single  principle  of  Beauty  have  failed  (i) 
because  they  have  been  too  restricted  and  too  artificial, 
and  (2)  because  they  have  made  too  little  of  the  ultimate 
fact  that  Beauty  exists  as  a  quality  in  natural  objects, 
antecedent  to  and  independent  of  all  association. 

In  1856,  Professor  James  C.  Moffat  wrote  An  Introdtic- 
tion  to  the  Study  of  Aesthetics.  It  is  slight,  but  it  has  the 
interest  and  the  merit  of  being  the  pioneer  work  on  the 
subject  in  American  literature,  so  far  as  systematic  con- 
struction goes. 

In  1867,  Professor  John  Bascom,  President  of  the  Uni- 
versity of  Wisconsin,  issued  at  Boston  an  ^Esthetics,  or  the 
Science  of  Beauty.  He  maintained  that  Beauty  was  an 
uncompounded  essence,  which  could  not  be  analysed  into 
simpler  elements.  We  cannot  define  it,  but  we  can  state 
the  conditions  of  its  presence.  It  is  "  the  utterance  in 
visible  form  of  some  thought  or  feeling"  (p.  14),  and  objects 
become  beautiful  in  proportion  as  they  express  thought 
and  feeling.  It  is  the  presence  of  vital  force  in  the  organic 
world  that  makes  its  products  beautiful  (p.  27),  and  in  the 
natural  world  "the  acceptance  of  the  law  of  reason,  the 
victory  of  the  right  in  the  midst  of  conflict"  (p.  44). 
Expression  is  the  first  condition  of  beauty  in  objects,  but 
a  second  is  Unity ',  or  unity  in  variety.  This  is  simply  "  the 
method  of  expression,  the  form  which  utterance  assumes  " 
(pp.  45,  46).  Its  third  characteristic  is  Truth  (p.  62). 
"  This  again  is  subordinate  to,  and  modifies  the  expression. 
Unity  was  its  method,  Truth  is  its  means.  It  is  its 
utterance,  through  natural  and  real,  not  through  artificial 
and  arbitrary  signs"  (p.  67).  As  to  the  faculty  by  which 
Beauty  is  reached  and  discerned.  It  is  not  by  the  senses, 
nor  is  it  by  reasoning ;  it  is  by  "  an  internal  intuition " 
(P-  95). 

2.    1867  tO  1876 

In  1867,  President  George  W.  Samson,  at  that  time 
head  of  the  Columbian  College,  Washington,  published  his 


274  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful          CHAP. 

Elements  of  Art  Criticism.  In  the  Introduction  he  tells  us 
that  "  the  design  of  the  treatise  is  to  present  in  their  con- 
nection the  elementary  principles  on  which  is  founded  a 
just  criticism  of  Art,  and  to  illustrate  these  principles  in  the 
history  of  Art  execution."  There  are  seven  Books  in  this 
treatise.  The  ist  is  on  the  Principles  of  Criticism,  the 
2d  on  Drawing,  the  3d  on  Sculpture,  the  4th  on  Archi- 
tecture, the  5th  on  Painting,  the  6th  on  Landscape  Garden- 
ing, and  the  7th  on  the  Decorative  Arts.  "  Art,"  says  Mr. 
Samson,  "  addresses  the  mind  through  some  one  of  the 
bodily  organs.  Its  appeals  are  distinguished  from  purely 
intellectual  or  spiritual  impressions,  in  that  they  are  always 
accompanied  by,  and  are  produced  through,  a  sensation 
of  the  bodily  organs,  as  of  sight  or  hearing  "  (p.  1 1 ).  The 
world  without  us  is  made  for  the  enjoyment  of  Art.  All  the 
inferior  senses — smell,  taste,  touch — contribute  indirectly 
to  the  impressions  made  by  Art  ;  but  the  higher  senses — 
sight  and  hearing — contribute  much  more.  He  considers 
the  inquiry,  "  What  is  Beauty  ?  "  however,  to  be  as  irrational 
as  the  inquiry,  "  What  is  Truth  ?  "  "  If  any  reply  be  given 
to  the  questions,  What  is  Truth,  Beauty,  Goodness,  and 
Right  ?  it  can  only  be  stated  thus.  Truth  is  that  in  the 
essence  of  a  thing  which  corresponds  with  the  conviction  of 
our  understanding ;  Beauty  is  that  in  the  qualities  of  an 
object  which  affords  pleasure  to  our  sensibilities  ;  Goodness 
is  that  in  the  relation  of  one  thing  to  another  which  secures 
the  welfare  or  promotes  the  interest  of  the  latter  ;  and 
Right  is  that  in  the  act  of  an  intelligent  being  which  corre- 
sponds with  our  conviction  of  the  responsibility  of  one 
moral  being  to  another"  (Book  I.  ch.  v.  p.  129).  He 
defines  Taste  very  vaguely  as  the  power  of  the  mind  which 
gives  rise  to  the  idea  of  the  Beautiful.  His  discussion  of 
objective  Beauty  is  not  profound.  He  follows  the  more 
popular  and  conventional  authors.  ^Esthetic  judgment  is 
that  "  power  of  the  mind  by  which  we  decide  that  an  object 
is  beautiful " — not  a  very  luminous  definition  certainly  !  In 
his  treatment  of  the  Arts,  in  which  Beauty  finds  expression, 
Mr.  Samson  is  more  successful  than  he  is  in  his  discussion 
of  first  principles. 


xin  The  Philosophy  of  America  275 

Art;  its  Laws,  and  the  Reasons  for  them  is  the  title  of 
a  work  by  Samuel  P.  Long,  published  in  1871.  He  dis- 
cusses the  principles  of  Beauty  and  of  Art,  and  then  of  the 
works  of  artists.  He  holds  that  Beauty  is  an  inherent 
element  in  objects,  and  hence  that  a  standard  of  Beauty  is 
possible,  and  real ;  but  he  thinks  that  the  evolution  of 
Beauty  is  inconsistent  with  such  a  standard,  and  therefore 
opposes  it. 

In  the  following  year  (1872),  Professor  Henry  N.  Day 
published  The  Science  of  ^Esthetics;  or  the  Nature,  Kinds, 
Laws,  and  Uses  of  Beauty.  Mr.  Day  holds  (i)  that 
Beauty  is  objective  and  real,  and  (2)  that  it  embraces 
three  elements — the  first  ideal,  the  second  material,  the 
third  formal ;  thought,  matter,  and  form  giving  rise  respect- 
ively to  these  three.  (3)  That  the  laws  of  Beauty  are 
those  of  Production  and  of  Interpretation ;  and  he  dis- 
cusses them  both  intrinsically,  and  in  their  relation  to  the 
Fine  Arts. 

A  lecture  originally  delivered  at  the  University  of  Ver- 
mont, by  Professor  Joseph  Torrey,  was  published  in  1874, 
under  the  title  of  A  Theory  of  Fine  Art.  It  discusses  the 
characteristics  both  of  Beauty  and  Sublimity,  the  relation  of 
Beauty  to  Nature,  and  the  several  Arts  in  detail.  It  also 
treats  of  the  cultivation  of  Taste.  "  The  end  of  all  the 
imaginative  Arts,"  the  author  writes,  "is  to  express  the 
truth  of  things  in  sensible  forms,  and  in  such  a  way  that 
their  forms,  so  far  as  Art  is  concerned,  have  no  other  use 
or  purpose  than  simply  to  serve  as  the  expression  of  Truth 
in  its  unchanging  nature."  But  while  this  may  be  ad- 
mitted, we  surely  require  something  more  in  a  theory  of 
Fine  Art  than  the  affirmation  that  the  Beautiful  is  the  True, 
reaching  us  through  sense  or  imagination,  and  felt  rather 
than  understood.  That  seems  rather  an  abandonment  of 
theory,  than  an  attempt  to  construct  one. 

A  lecture  by  George  S.  Morris  on  "  The  Philosophy  of 
Art  "  is  published  in  the  Journal  of  Speculative  Philosophy 
for  January  1876.  It  is  a  criticism  of  M.  Taine's  Philo- 
sophie  de  FArt  en  Italie,  and  contains  an  effective  defence 
of  idealism  as  against  the  imitative  theory  of  art.  Art  is  not 


276  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

"  the  representation  of  something  seen,  but  the  represent- 
ation of  something  which  we  would  like  to  see,  which  is 
akin  to  our  nature,  towards  which  our  truest  being  strives. 
The  Apollo  Belvidere  does  not  interest  us  as  the  likeness 
of  any  one  who  probably  ever  existed,  but  as  expressing  a 
phase  of  noble  humanity,  a  germ  of  divinity.  The  Sistine 
Madonna  does  not  please  us,  as  being  a  fair  representation 
of  the  way  in  which  the  Virgin  Mary  looked,  but  as 
pourtraying  the  parent  of  divine  qualities  "  (p.  9).  But  the 
true  artist  is  the  interpreter  of  true,  real,  and  essential 
being  ;  and  the  "  greatest  strokes  of  genius,  in  all  the  arts, 
impress  us  as  being  the  simplest  and  most  natural  things  in 
the  world.  ...  It  is  that  our  inner  selves  are  at  home, 
however  unconsciously  to  ourselves,  in  an  ideal  realm  of 
perfect  being." 

In  the  succeeding  number  of  the  same  Journal  (April 
1876),  the  editor,  Mr.  W.  T.  Harris,  contributes  a  very 
suggestive  paper  on  the  relation  of  Art  to  Religion. 

Contributions  by  English  writers  to  American  journals 
must  be  regarded  as  American  literature,  and  they  occur 
frequently.  In  an  article  published  in  the  Eclectic  Maga- 
zine^ New  York,  March  1876,  an  English  statesman,  Mr. 
W.  E.  Gladstone,  discusses  "  Science  and  Art,  Utility  and 
Beauty."  In  it  he  writes  :  "  Here  lay  the  secret  of  the 
paramount  excellence  of  the  Greek,  that  his  Art  was  ever 
aiming  at  the  ideal,  and  the  infinite.  And  the  true  cause 
of  this  remarkable  direction  of  the  Artist's  purpose  was,  and 
is  to  be  found,  unless  I  am  much  mistaken,  in  the  specific 
character  of  his  religion.  Humanising  the  god,  he  was 
constrained  to  divinise  the  man,  to  invest  his  form,  the 
central  type  and  norm  of  Beauty,  with  the  strength,  the 
majesty,  the  beauty,  and  the  grace  of  the  superhuman. 
The  effect  was,  that  he  was  always  seeking  something  more 
than  he  had  reached  ;  like  in  this  to  the  miser  and  to  the 
saint,  in  both  of  whom  the  appetite  grows  with  what  it  feeds 
upon  "  (pp.  293,  294).  A  very  eloquent  plea  follows  for  the 
alliance  of  Beauty  with  Utility,  the  ideal  with  the  useful,  in 
all  industrial  work  ;  in  other  words,  for  the  introduction  of 
the  fine  arts  within  the  useful  ones. 


xni  The  Philosophy  of  America  277 


3.  1880  to  i8go 

In  1880,  Professor  John  Steinfort  Kedney  (Fairbault, 
Minnesota)  published  The  Beautiful  and  the  Sublime,  an 
analysis  of  these  emotions,  and  a  determination  of  the 
objectivity  of  Beauty.  This  is  a  constructive  attempt  to 
reach  first  principles  in  ^Esthetics.  Mr.  Kedney  holds  that 
Beauty  is  both  subjective  and  objective,  (i)  The  former 
(subjective  beauty)  is  grasped  by  us  in  our  pursuit  of  ideals, 
which  we  always  objectify,  or  incarnate  in  some  visible 
form.  We  succeed  so  far,  in  our  pursuit  of  the  ideal ;  and 
in  this  we  find  the  Beautiful.  But  when  we  also  find  that 
it  is  only  very  partially  grasped  by  us,  and  that  it  transcends 
us,  in  this  we  find  the  Sublime.  Sublimity  is  of  two  kinds, 
mathematical  and  dynamical.  The  moral  ideal  gives  rise 
to  moral  beauty  and  sublimity.  (2)  Objective  Beauty  is  a 
disclosure  to  us  of  the  soul  of  the  Universe,  in  its  manifold- 
ness.  It  is  always  moving  on,  developing  new  phases  ; 
while  the  actual  approximates  to  the  ideal.  Professor 
Kedney's  is  one  of  the  best  books  on  the  subject  which 
America  has  produced. 

In  1880,  Dr.  James  M'Cosh,  President  of  Princeton 
College,  published  a  work  on  The  Emotions.  In  the  third 
chapter  of  the  2d  Book  he  discusses  the  aesthetic  emo- 
tions, which  he  describes  generally  as  the  "emotions 
called  forth  by  inanimate  objects."  He  thinks  the  term 
"  Kallology "  would  be  the  best  to  describe  the  science ; 
but  it  is  too  cumbrous,  and  the  verdict  of  time  is  already 
against  it.  He  arranges  the  theories  of  the  Beautiful 
under  three  heads  —  (i)  those  which  represent  it  as  a 
mental  quality  in  objects,  perceived  by  the  mind  ;  (2)  those 
which  regard  it  as  an  objective  quality  in  things  themselves ; 
and  (3)  those  which  consider  it  to  be  the  product  of 
association.  He  admits  that  many  of  our  aesthetic  emotions 
start  from  sensation.  Sweet  sounds  and  rich  colours  con- 
stitute an  earthly  paradise,  which  may  become  the  soil  in 
which  the  plant  of  ethical  beauty  may  grow.  In  this 
section  Dr.  M'Cosh  seems  to  endorse  the  teaching  of  Mr. 


278  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

Grant  Allen,  in  his  Physiological  Esthetics.  He  rises  from 
Physical  to  Intellectual  Beauty,  and  under  the  latter  head 
traces  (i)  sameness  in  difference  ;  (2)  the  relation  of  whole 
and  parts,  and  means  and  ends ;  (3)  resemblance  in 
co-ordinated  classes;  (4)  space  relations;  (5)  time  rela- 
tions ;  (6)  relations  of  quantity  ;  (7)  relations  of  active  pro- 
perty ;  and  (8)  the  ideas  raised  in  us  by  causality  or 
power.  He  maintains  that  the  sentiment  of  Beauty  "may 
vary  infinitely  by  reason  of  the  mixture  of  its  elements." 
He  admits  the  truth  in  the  theory  of  Association,  and 
enlarges  again,  in  a  distinct  chapter — but  quite  superfluously 
— on  "the  complexity  of  the  aesthetic  affection. "  The  pic- 
turesque, the  ludicrous,  and  the  sublime  are  all  discussed ; 
but  there  is  no  thorough  grappling  with  the  difficulties  of 
the  problem.  Though  superior  to  Mr.  Symington's  dis- 
cussion of  the  subject,  Dr.  M 'Cosh's  book  is  in  some 
respects  its  American  representative  or  equivalent.  Part  of 
the  discussion  is  merely  that  of  the  topographical  guide-book. 
The  Nature  and  Function  of  Art,  more  especially  of 
Architecture,  by  Mr.  Leopold  Eidlitz,  1881.  In  the  first 
part  of  this  book  its  author  discusses  the  condition  of  Archi- 
tecture in  his  own  time  ;  in  the  second  part  he  deals  with 
the  nature  and  function  of  Art;  in  the  third  he  returns  to 
Architecture,  and  discusses  its  nature.  He  gives  a  sketch 
of  Art  theories,  but  he  is  not  luminous  in  this,  or  in  his 
estimate  of  Beauty.  Qlts  power  of  producing  pleasurable 
emotion  is  the  test  by  which  we  Judge  a  work  of  Art ! 
The  book  is  crude  and  cumbrous.]  Its  character  may 
be  judged  by  the  following  quotation  : — "  The  nature  of 
Beauty  is  to  be  found  in  the  successful  expression  of 
an  idea  in  matter.  The  idea  itself  may  be  the  reverse  of 
beautiful,  or  true,  or  moral.  The  objects  selected  for  the 
purpose  of  representing  the  idea  may'  be  ugly  ;  yet  the 
result  of  all  this  is  beauty,  if  the  idea  is  successfully 
represented.  Objective  beauty  consists  in  the  capacity  of 
an  organism  to  perform  a  function,  and  in  the  clear  expres- 
sions of  this  capacity  in  its  form  ;  and  beauty  in  art  is  the 
rendering  of  this  form  in  matter  for  the  purpose  of  ex- 
pressing the  function "  (pp.  1 8  6,  187). 


xiii  The  Philosophy  of  America  279 

In  two  articles  in  the  Journal  of  Speculative  Philosophy 
(April  and  July  1882)  Mr.  Meads  Tuthill  discusses  "Use, 
Beauty,  Reason ;  or  Science,  Art,  Religion."  He  thinks 
that  Beauty  rises  from  utility.  It  is  born  of  use,  yet  is 
something  quite  independent  of  it — its  soul  or  spirit.  "It 
floats  in  the  ether,  as  a  being  apart  and  different."  "  Its 
use  is  for  itself  alone.  It  does  not  perish  in  the  using,  but 
lives  in  the  thought  which  alone  can  use  it."  It  is  this 
that  makes  it  universal.  Its  use  always  limits  an  object. 
It  is  only  when  every  special  or  particular  use  has  dis- 
appeared from  an  object,  and  ceased  to  limit  it,  that  its 
beauty  is  universal,  or  for  all  men.  It  thus  partakes  of 
infinitude  ;  and,  in  pursuing  it,  we  are  identified  with  it. 
For  the  time  being,  it  transforms  the  beholder.  In  discern- 
ing it,  he  discerns  the  Infinite,  and  his  relation  to  it — his 
oneness  with  it.  But  he  does  not  do  this  always.  It  is 
not  a  permanent  consciousness,  but  comes  and  goes  ;  and, 
in  contact  with  the  Infinite,  man  is  cut  off  from  the  object 
of  his  knowledge,  as  well  as  united  to  it.  Thus  the  con- 
sciousness of  Beauty  becomes  a  sort  of  two-edged  sword, 
that  divides  the  spirit  from  its  object ;  and,  out  of  the 
intense  craving  to  recover  what  is  lost,  Art  arises.  It  is 
creative,  because  we  desire  to  record,  to  externalise,  and  to 
preserve  what  we  first  perceive  within,  i.e.  to  create  and  to 
preserve  it,  not  for  ourselves,  but  for  all  The  very  principle 
which  at  first  guided  the  artist  to  perceive  the  Beautiful 
impels  him  afterwards  to  re-create  it,  and  guides  him  in 
the  art  of  creation. 

Reference  should  also  be  made  to  the  translations,  in  the 
American  Journal  of  Specidative  Philosophy,  of  portions  of 
Hegel's  Aesthetik — ( i )  the  transcript  of  the  French  version 
of  Ch.  Benard,  by  j.  A.  Martling,  in  ten  sections  (1867- 
1869)  ;  (2)  the  sections  on  Chivalry  translated  from  the 
German  by  S.  A.  Longwill  (1872-1873)  ;  (3)  those  portions 
of  the  Aesthetik  dealing  with  Symbolic,  Classical,  and 
Romantic  Art,  translated  by  W.  M.  Bryant  (1877-1879). 
It  need  hardly  be  said  that  a  translation  from  a  translation 
is  seldom  satisfactory,  and  a  translation  of  Hegel  coming 
through  the  French  into  English — though  not  quite  so 


280  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful         CHAP. 

bad  as  the  filtration  of  Aristotle's  Greek  into  scholastic 
Latin  through  the  Arabic  version  of  Averroes  and  his 
school — is  not  conducive  to  the  clear  grasp  of  a  system 
that  is  in  itself  somewhat  obscure. 

In  1885,  Professor  Kedney,  whose  work  on  the  Beautiful 
and  the  Sublime  is  referred  to  at  p.  277,  wrote  "a  critical 
exposition  "  of  Hegel's  ^Esthetics.  It  is  partly  a  translation, 
partly  a  reproduction,  in  part  a  summary,  and  to  a  certain 
extent  a  commentary  on  the  original. 

In  the  second  part  of  Professor  J.  Clark  Murray's 
Handbook  of  Psychology  (Montreal  1885),  on  "Special 
Psychology,"  there  is  a  chapter  on  Idealisation,  and  in  it  a 
section  on  "  the  ^Esthetic  ideal."  With  many  other  writers, 
Mr.  Murray  begins  by  noting  the  disinterested  nature  of  the 
aesthetic  feelings.  They  are  free  from  any  alloy,  either  of 
egoism  or  altruism  ;  and  he  conjoins  with  this  the  play- 
impulse  of  Schiller.  But  it  is  more  than  feeling.  It  has 
an  intellectual  element  also,  and  involves  the  consciousness 
of  an  object,  viz.  Beauty.  By  rearranging  the  materials 
received  by  the  mind  from  sense,  the  plastic  imagination 
creates  new  forms.  The  composite  wholes  which  are  decom- 
posed or  analysed  into  parts,  in  order  that  they  may  be 
again  recombined,  are  of  two  kinds,  quantitative  and  quali- 
tative. The  attribute  of  Beauty,  which  the  intellect  dis- 
cerns, and  with  which  it  clothes  its  objects,  is  unity  in 
variety.  The  Fine  Arts  are  distinguished  from  the  useful 
and  mechanical  ones,  but  they  are  often  combined,  and 
enhance  each  other ;  utility,  or  the  adaptation  of  means  to 
ends,  being  an  illustration  of  unity  in  variety.  Mr.  Murray 
next  deals  with  the  several  Arts  in  detail — (i)  those  which 
address  themselves  to  the  eye,  viz.  Sculpture,  Architecture, 
and  Painting  ;  (2)  that  which  addresses  the  ear,  viz.  Music  ; 
and  (3)  that  which  uses  language  as  its  medium,  and  has 
its  outcome  in  Poetry  and  the  Belles  Lettres. 

In  1887,  John  Dewey,  Assistant-Professor  of  Philosophy 
in  the  University  of  Michigan,  issued  a  text-book  on  Psy- 
chology, the  fifteenth  chapter  of  which  is  devoted  to 
"^Esthetic  Feeling."  He  first  analyses  aesthetic  feeling 
into  its  various  elements,  and  after  considering  it  as  a 


xni  The  Philosophy  of  America  281 

spring  to  activity  in  the  Fine  Arts,  he  deals  with  aesthetic 
judgment,  or  taste.  Both  knowledge  and  character  (i.e. 
the  true  and  the  good)  are  felt  to  be  beautiful  as  well  as 
objects  in  external  Nature,  when  a  sense  of  satisfaction  is 
felt  in  them.  There  is,  however,  in  all  Art  a  sensuous 
element,  which  is  the  vehicle  for  presenting  the  ideal. 
Purely  realistic  and  purely  idealistic  art  are  both  equally 
impossible.  Esthetic  feeling  is  universal.  The  lower 
senses  contribute  nothing  to  it,  and  it  excludes  the  feeling 
of  ownership,  as  well  as  of  utility,  or  subservience  to  ends 
external  to  itself.  Its  most  general  property  is  harmony, 
or  unity  in  variety,  and  especially  the  harmony  of  the  object 
recognised  as  beautiful  with  the  nature  recognising  it.  But 
aesthetic  feeling  is  not  merely  passive,  it  also  actively 
creates  ;  and  the  outcome  of  its  creative  activity  is  the  Fine 
Arts.  ./Esthetic  judgment,  or  taste,  has  two  sides,  an 
objective  and  a  subjective  one.  On  its  objective  side  it 
attributes  Beauty  to  objects  ;  on  its  subjective  side,  it  is 
admiration  or  delight  in  objects.  We  gather  our  principles 
of  taste  from  a  reflex  study  of  the  way  in  which  our  feelings 
spontaneously  and  naturally  express  themselves  ;  but  our 
ideal  of  Beauty  is  not  a  fixed,  but  an  ever-progressive  ideal. 
Professor  George  Trumbull  Ladd,  of  Yale  University, 
has  just  issued  an  Introduction  to  Philosophy,  the  twelfth 
chapter  of  which  is  devoted  to  "  /Esthetics."  He  considers 
that  the  problems  which  arise  in  this  section  of  Philosophy 
are  similar  to  those  which  meet  us  in  Ethics.  "The 
Beautiful  is  one  form  of  the  Good  ;  to  be,  and  to  enjoy,  that 
which  is  beautiful  is  to  share  in  the  reality  of  the  good." 
The  beautiful  must  be  agreeable ;  but  as  an  ideal  it  may  be 
defined,  as  Hegel  states  it,  "  the  sensible  manifestation  of 
the  idea."  All  objects  which  are  beautiful  produce  in  us 
pleasurable  feeling  ;  but,  although  it  is  difficult  to  draw  a 
line  of  separation  between  them,  the  beautiful  is  distin- 
guished from  the  agreeable  by  two  things — (i)  by  its  object- 
ive reality,  and  (2)  by  its  ideal  worth.  It  is  probably  the 
agreeable,  and  not  the  beautiful,  that  exclusively  influences 
the  life  of  the  lower  animals  ;  but,  with  man,  each  one  of  the 
lowest  appetites  may  be  transfigured  by  its  aesthetic  signifi- 


282  The  Philosophy  of  the  Beautiful      CH.  xm 

cance.  Besides,  pleasurable  experience  may  itself  become 
beautiful.  The  standard  of  Beauty  varies  with  individuals 
more  than  the  standard  of  the  Good.  "  It  cannot  be  said 
that  the  voice  of  beauty  comes  to  the  soul  in  the  form  of  a 
categorical  imperative"  (p.  333)  ;  and  yet  "the  feeling  for 
the  beautiful  is  a  very  powerful  stimulus  and  guide  of  human 
conduct."  The  life  of  the  individual  percipient  of  Beauty  is 
projected  into  the  life  of  the  objects  he  perceives.  Mr. 
Ladd  seems  doubtful  of  the  possibility  of  determining  the 
universal  and  real  essence  of  Beauty.  It  might  be  easier 
to  say  what  is  the  special  essence  of  each  of  the  separate 
Arts  which  disclose  it.  The  final  difficulty  is  partly  due  to 
the  very  nature  of  the  subject.  The  feeling  for  the  ideal, 
and  its  pursuit,  are  phases  of  the  soul's  yearning  for  some- 
thing higher  than  it  has  attained  to  ;  ideal  Beauty  being  the 
goal  of  all  our  varied  strivings. 

As  the  sheets  of  this  volume  are  passing  through  the 
press,  a  small  book  has  been  received  entitled  ^Esthetics j 
its  Problems  and  Literature,  by  Fred.  N.  Scott,  Assistant- 
Professor  of  Rhetoric  in  the  University  of  Michigan,  in 
1890.  He  divides  the  problems  thus — (i)  Physiological, 
the  question  of  the  origin,  and  nature  of  the  thrill  of 
pleasure  given  by  the  objects  which  we  recognise  as 
beautiful ;  under  which  he  has  twelve  different  subsidiary 
problems,  relating  to  the  nervous  system  and  its  stimuli, 
etc.  ;  (2)  Psychological,  the  nature  of  aesthetic  feeling,  and 
of  the  correlated  facts  of  consciousness  ;  under  which  there 
are  ten  subsidiary  problems,  referring  to  sensation,  per- 
ception, imagination,  will,  etc.  ;  (3)  Speculative,  the  nature 
of  Beauty,  and  its  aesthetic  value,  its  kinds,  and  their 
relation  to  Nature  and  to  Art.  The  literature  of  ^Esthetics 
he  ranges  in  two  sections,  and  gives  a  very  ample  catalogue 
of  writers  in  English,  French,  and  German. 

This  is,  however,  given  with  greater  elaboration  and 
detail  in  A  Guide  to  the  Literature  of  Esthetics,  by  C.  M. 
Gayley,  Professor  of  English  Language  and  Literature  in 
the  University  of  California,  and  F.  N.  Scott,  Michigan, 
also  just  published  at  Berkeley,  U.S.A. 


INDEX 


ADDISON,  Joseph,  167 

Akenside,  M. ,  204 

Albani,  Cardinal,  53 

Albert!,  Leon  Battista,  143,  144, 

145 

Alfieri,  151 
Alison,  J. ,   187,   202,   205,   213, 

226,  232,  269 
Allen,  G. ,  246,  249,  261 
Alphen,  H.  van,  154 
Amiel,  H.  F. ,  120 
Andr£,   Pere,   91,  93,   100,   102, 

117,  170 
Angelo,  Michael,  145,  213,  237, 

238,  257,  271 
Anselm,  St.,  152 
Apelles,  41 
Apollonius,  42 

Aquinas,  Thomas,  4,  44,  45,  136 
Aristippus,  22 
Aristotle,  27,  28,  29,  30,  32,  39, 

41,  132,  142,  266,  280 
Arnold,  Matthew,  xi.  264 
Arrian,  41 
Ast,  67 
Augustine,  St.,  ix.  4,  43,  44,  91, 

IOI,    112,    117 

Augustus,  40 
Averroes,  280 

BACON,  F. ,  164 
Bain,  A.,  233 
Balzac,  91,  92 
Bardon,  D.,  97 


Barni,  Jules,  117 

Barns,  W.,  234 

Ban-owes,  173 

Bascom,  J. ,  273 

Batteux,  52,  101,  103,  155 

Baumgarten,  vii.  51 

Bayliss,  W.,  249 

Beattie,  J.,  184 

Beaumont,  Sir  G. ,  224 

Begg,  W.  P.,  264 

Bell,  Sir  Charles,  195 

Bellars,  W.,  248 

Bellegarde,  Abbe",  95 

Bellori,  J.  P.,  144,  145 

Be"nard,  Charles,  142,  279 

Bergmann,  J.,  88 

Berkeley,  E. ,  170 

Blackie,  J.  S. ,  232 

Blanc,  Ch.,  128,  231 

Bocchi,  F. ,  143 

Bodmer,  J.  J.,  53 

Boileau,  87,  93,  94,  108,  132 

Bolzano,  B. ,  65 

Bosanquet,  B.,  263 

Bouterwek,  F.,  64 

Brewster,  Sir  D.,  215 

Brown,  Thomas,  204,  205,  226 

Browning,  R.,  112 

Bryant,  W.  M.,  279 

Burner,  Pere,  97,  100,  179 

Buffon,  94 

Burger  (see  There1),  127 

Burke,  E.,  175 

Burns,  R. ,  213 


284 


Index 


Butler,  G.,  227 
Byck,  S.  A.,  142 

CALKER,  F.,  64 

Calkoen,  J.  F.  van  B.,  156 

Carlyle,  Thomas,  216 

Carneri,  B. ,  142 

Carracci,  the,  145 

Carriere,  M. ,  77 

Cassiodorius,  44 

Castiglione,  145 

Catullus,  37,  38 

Cherbuliez,  C.  V.,  122 

Chevreul,  M.  E.,  113 

Chrysippus,  42 

Cicero,  35,  39 

Clemens  Alexandrinus,  43 

Cle'ment,  M. ,  257 

Clito,  22 

Cobbe,  F.  P.,  234 

Cohen,  H. ,  59  (note) 

Coleridge,  S.  T.,  198 

Collingwood,  G. ,  259 

Comte,  A.,  in,  142 

Condillac,  146 

Constable,  201 

Cook,  E. ,  220 

Corneille,  93 

Correggio,  203 

Coster,  G.  H.  de,  133 

Cottle,  J.,  198  (note) 

Cousin,    Victor,    51,    106,    in, 

226 

Crane,  L. ,  256 

Crousaz,  J.  P.  de,  95,  roo,  102 
Cunningham,  A.,  201  (note] 

D'ALEMBERT,  102,  196 

Damiron,  M.,  114 

Dante,  46 

Darwin,  Charles,  238,  257 

Darwin,  Erasmus,  193 

Da  Vinci,    Leonardo,    144,    145, 

203,  257 
Day,  H.  N.,  275 
De  Brosses,  100 
Delfico,  146 
De  Quincey,  Q. ,  109 


Descartes,  4,  91,  138 

Dewey,  John,  280 

Dickie,  229 

Diderot,  61,  87,  103,  104,   106, 

196 

Diodorus  Siculus,  40 
Dobell,  S.,  248 
Dodsley,  172 

Donaldson,  John  (1751-1801),  1 84 
Dryden,  96,  164 
Dubos,  Abbd,  96 
Dufresnoy,    Chas.    A.,    96,    164, 

182 
Diirer,  Albrecht,  48 

EBERHARD,  J.  A.,  55 
Edelburg,  E.  von,  143 
Eidlitz,  L.,  278 
Eliot,  George,  xii. 
Eme"ric-David,  T.  B.,  108 
Emerson,  R.  W.,  270 
Epictetus,  41 
Erigena,  80,  146 
Euphranor,  36 

FAN,  J.,  272  (note) 
Fechner,  G.  T.,  86,  90 
Ferguson,  J. ,  224 
Ferrari,  G.  S.,  152 
Ferri,  L.,  152 
Fichte,  66,  67,  69 
Fischer,  E.  K.  B.,  76,  77 
Flaxman,  201 
Fock,  A.  L.,  159 
Formey,  J.  B.  H. ,  102 
Foster,  F.  W.,  xii. 
Fouille~e,  M.  A.,  139 
Friedlander,  59 
Fuseli,  96,  194 

GALEN,  41,  42 
Galuppi,  P. ,  146 
Gautier,  M.  T.,  128 
Gayley  and  Scott,  xii.  283 
Gerard,  A.,  179 
Gilpin,  W. ,  189,  197 
Gioberti,  V. ,  146,  148 
Giotto,  223 


Index 


285 


Gladstone,  W.  E.,  276 
Goethe,  xi.  60,  64,  105,  140,  266 
Guizot,  112 
Guyau,  J.  M.,  138 

HAMANN,  60 

Hamilton,  Sir  W. ,  206 

Harris,  J.,  172 

Harris,  W.  T.,  276 

Hartmann,  E.  von,  80 

Hastie,  W.,  266 

Hay,  D.  R.,  144,  213,  226,  228, 

231,  232 

Haydon,  B.  W.,  272 
Hazlitt,  W.,  202 
Hegel,  6,  43,  70,  74,  76,  77,  78, 

95,  142,   263,  266,  279,   280, 

2813 

Helmholtz,  H.  L.  F.  von,  84,  261 
Hemsterhuis,  F.,  153 
Hennequin,  E.,  141 
Hensde,  Ph.  W.  van,  157 
Herbart,  J.  F.,  67,  69,  88 
Herder,  J.  G.,  59 
Hettner,  H.,  54 
Hippias,  23,  24 
Hippocrates,  41 
Hirt,  36 
Hoare,  P.,  195 
Hoffding,  H.,  90 
Hogarth,     William,     173,     196, 

212 

Holmes-Forbes,  A.  W.,  255 
Homer,  33,  37 
Hope,  272 
Horace,  38,  39 
Horner,  L.  and  J.  B.,  89 
Horsfall,  T.  C,  259 
Houssaye,  M.  Arsene,  128 
Howard,  Henry,  205,  206 
Hugo,  Victor,  142 
Humboldt,  W.  von,  17,  64 
Hume,  D.,  176 
Hunt,  Holman,  265 
Hutcheson,  F.,  137,  169 

IDDESLEIGH,  Lord,  227 
Imhoff,  P.,  116 


JACOBI,  60,  64,  170 

Jeffrey,  F.,  187,   188,   213,   226, 

228,  232,  269,  270 
Jones,  Owen,  10,  13,  230 
Jourrroy,  Th.,  in,  114 
Jungmann,  J.,  88 

KANT,  vii.  6,  56,  62,  64,  66,  67, 
69,  78,  88,  90,  in,  116,  136, 
170 

Kedney,  John  Steinfort,  277, 
280 

Kepler,  144 

Ker,  W.  P.,  257 

Ke"ratry,  116 

Kirkman,  J.,  142 

Knight,  Payne,  190,  191,  195 

Knox,  R.,  272  (note) 

Kbstlin,  K.,  76 

Krantz,  E.,  138 

Krause,  K.  C.  F.,  69 

LADD,  G.  T.,  281 

La  Harpe,  108 

Lamennais,  F.  R.  de,  113 

Land,  J.  P.  N.,  161 

Lang,  A.,  9 

Lauder,  Sir  Th.  Dick,  190,  212 

Laugel,  M.  A.,  129 

Lavater,  194 

Lee,  Vernon,  219 

Leghe,  P.,  214 

Leibnitz,  4,  50,  51,  67 

Lessing,  G.  E.,  54,  62,  77,  78, 

97,  172,  266 
L6v£que,  6,  in,  123 
Lichtental,  P.,  148 
Lindsay,  Lord,  222 
Long,  S.  P.,  275 
Longhi,  G.,  146 
Longinus,  33 
Longwill,  S.  A.,  279 
Lorme,  M.  de,  114 
Lorrain,  Claude,  210 
Lotze,  68,  82,  121 
Lucretius,  35,  36,  37,  38 
Ludwig,  H.,  144 
Lysippus,  41 


286 


Index 


M'CosH,  229,  277 

MacDougall,  P.,  205 

Mackenzie,  G.  S. ,  201 

M' Vicar,  208,  228 

Magnus,  H. ,  250 

Maher,  M.,  266 

Malebranche,  101 

Mamiani,   Count   Terenzio    146, 

iSi 

Mandeville,  168 
Marmontel,  Jean  Fra^ois,   107, 

108 

Martianus  Capella,  44 
Martling,  J.  A.,  279 
Mason,  W.,  96,  182 
Massano,  M.,  145 
Maximus  Tyrius,  42 
Medici,  Cosmo  de,  46 
Meier,  F. ,  52 
Mendelssohn,  Moses,  55 
Mengs,  A.  R.,  55,  195 
Merz,  T.,  50 
Mill,  James,  205 
Milman,  H.  H. ,  200 
Milsand,  J.,  126 
Moffat,  J.  C,  273 
Montaigne,  92 
Montesquieu,  106 
Morris,  G.  S.,  275 
Morris,  W. ,  254,  265 
Mott,  F.  T.,  253 
Mozley,  J.  B.,  246 
Miiller,  Max,  17 
Murray,  J.  C.,  280 

NADEN,  C.,  260 
Naville,  Edouard,  14 
Newton,  Isaac,  213 
Niccola  Pisano,  223 
Nicolai,  F.,  52 
Nicole,  P.,  94 
Niphus,  A.,  144 
Nugent,  T.,  97 

OERSTED,  37,  89 
Omar  Khayyam,  viii. 
Opzoomer,  C.  W.,  158 


PAMPHILUS,  27 

Parker,  H.,  260 

Parrhasius,  27 

Pascal,  132 

Pater,  W.,  264 

Patmore,  C.,  265 

Pericles,  23 

Perponcher,  W.  E.  de,  155 

Phidias,  15,  21,  39,  41,  145,  206, 

267 

Philostratus,  36,  42 
Pictet,  A.,  118 
Pietro,  Sac.  S.  di,  152 
Plato,  ix.   4,  23,  24,  26,  27,  28, 

29.  30.  33.  4L  47.  67,  68,  72, 

91,   100,   101,  142,   163,   165, 

213,  219,  232,  257 
Plautus,  36 
Pliny,  27,  36,  41,  198 
Plotinus,  30,  32,  33,  37,  199,  219 
Polycleitus,  42,  206 
Polygnotus,  41 
Poynter,  E.  J.,  236 
Praxiteles,  206 
Price,  R.,  178,  179 
Price,    Sir    Uvedale,    189,    197, 

212 

Proclus,  33,  34,  37 
Purdie,  T.,  226 

QUILTER,  H.,  263 
Quintilian,  27,  41 

RABELAIS,  92 

Racine,  108  • 

Ram,  F.,  256 

Ramsay,  G. ,  215 

Raphael,  145,  203,  237,  257 

Reid,  T.,  98,  185,  206 

Reinhold,  56 

Reni,  Guido,  145 

Repton,  H.,  190 

Reynolds,  Sir  J.,  180,  194,  196, 

203 

Richter,  J.  P.,  63 
Riedel,  F.  J.,  154 
Rig,  Jules,  142 


Index 


287 


Rio,  M.,  46,  120 
Riviere,  B, ,  265 
Rollin,  100 
Rosa,  Salvator,  210 
Rosenkrantz,  J.  K.  F. ,  76 
Rosmini-Serbati,  A.,  147 
Rousseau,  87 
Roy er- Collar d,  in,  113 
Rubens,  145 

Ruskin,  John,  216,  218,  238,  248, 
259 

SAINTE-BEUVE,  114 

Saint-Hilaire,  J.  B. ,  33  (note] 

Saisset,  E.,  114 

Samson,  G.  W.,  273 

Sauvagart,  D. ,  142 

Savonarola,  46,  47 

Schelling,  6,  65,  67,  69,  70,  74, 

in 
Schiller,  8,  61,   64,   70,   77,   90, 

95,  105,  in,  137,  139,  235 
Schlegel,  Friedrich  von,   63,  66, 

67,  69 

Schleiermacher,  70 
Schnasse,  C,  83 
Schopenhauer,  A.,  78 
Scott,  David,  217 
Scott,  F.  N.,  282 
Scott,  William  B.,  218,  233 
Seailles,  G.,  142 
Seeley,  J.  F.,  235 
Sellar,  W.  Y.,  37,  38 
Seneca,  41 

Shaftesbury,  Lord,  87,  164 
Shakespeare,  77 
Shenstone,  W.,  183 
Smith,  Adam,  179 
Socrates,  22,  23,  24,  257 
Solger,  U.  W.  F.,  68,  70 
Spence,  J.,  172 
Spencer,  H.,  139,  239,  245,  250, 

262 

Spinoza,  69,  80 
Stein,  H.  von,  87 
Stewart,  Dugald,  196 
Sully,  J.,  243 
Sulzer,  J.  G.,  52 


Superville,  H.  de,  156 
Symington,  A.  J.,  231,  278 
Symonds,  John  Addington,  M.  D. , 
231,  266 

TADEMA,  A.,  265 

Taine,  M.,  124,  275 

Talia,  146 

Tennyson,  A.,  vi. 

Thore',  T.  (see  Burger),  127,  129, 

133 

Thomson,  William,  192 
Tieck,  L.,  67 
Todhunter,  J. ,  240,  259 
Topffer,  108,  117 
Torrey,  J.,  275 
Tremblay,  J.  F.  du,  95 
Tucker,  A.,  183 
Turner,  J.  M.  W.,  201,  248 
Tuthill,  M.,  279 
Tyaneus,  A.,  145 
Tyler,  S.,  271 
Tylor,  Edward,  10 
Tyrwhitt,  St.  J. ,  247 

VALLET,  Abbe"  P.,  45,  133,  135 

Vandyke,  145 

Venanzio,  G. ,  146 

Vdron,  Eugene,  130,  142 

Vico,  146 

Vilete,  M.  C.  de  la,  100 

Vinci,    Leonardo   da,    144,    145, 

203,  257 
Vinet,  A.,  121 
Virgil,  35,  36,  37,  38 
Vischer,     F.    Theodor,    74,    77, 

85 

Visconti,  E.,  146 
Vitruvius,  M.  V.   Pollio,  40,  48, 

144 

Vloten,  J.  van,  160 
Voltaire,  103,  in 

WAGNER,  84 
Wallace,  A.  R.,  252 
Waterhouse,  C.  H.,  263 
Watts,  G.  F.,  265 


288 


Index 


Weisse,  Ch.  H. ,  76,  77 
Weyland,  M.,  116 
Wilkes,  173 
Wilkie,  D.,  201 
Wilson,  John,  205 
Winckelmann,    Johann    J.,     53, 

66,    95,   in,   194,    196,    264, 

271 
Wordsworth,  W.,  224  (note] 


Wyndham,  the  Right  Hon.  W. 
192 

XENOPHON,  22,  27 

ZEISING,  A.,  68,  86 
Zeuxis,  206 
Zimmermann,  R.,  68 
Zuccala,  G.,  148 


THE   END 


Printed  by  R.  &  R.  CLARK,  Edinburgh. 


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THE     ELEMENTS     OF     ETHICS.       By  JOHN    H.    MUIKHEAD, 
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OUTLINES  OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  By  WILLIAM 
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BRITISH  DOMINION  IN  INDIA.  By  Sir  ALFRED  LYALL, 
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